My Friend Tom
by CycoMW
Summary: When Voldemort gave Harry that scar he gave him two other things; a part of his soul and a friend. The last remnant of Tom Riddle's humanity mentors Harry. Eventual Harry/Hermione.
1. Chapter 1 - The Cupboard

**Chapter 1 - The Cupboard**

* * *

**Age 4**

Number four Privet Drive was a very boring house on a very boring street perfect for very boring people. The inhabitants liked to think they were normal and, compared to the rest of the inhabitants of the rather bland street, they were. However they had a problem. There was one individual living in their house that refused to conform to their idea of what normal meant. A small boy that was nearly at school age and that was their problem. How could they hide him now?

"We have to send him to school Vernon. What will the neighbours think if they see him around during the weekday?"

Vernon Dursley just snorted. He didn't like the idea but he hadn't been able to think of any alternative. Why he hadn't dumped the boy at an orphanage first chance he had he couldn't understand. He had considered it many times since but, each time he had gone to look in the phonebook for orphanages, he'd been distracted by something else that had needed doing. This just added to his frustration.

His wife continued, "I'll pick up some notebooks at the seconds shop for the boy. We got plenty of other things that Dudders has worn out that he can use."

Vernon grunted. He decided it was best just to let Petunia deal with it, as long as the boy didn't end up costing him much it wasn't worth the effort to worry about it.

Meanwhile, the boy in question sat inside the cupboard under the stairs and played with some old tin soldiers. Back and forth he marched them as he listened to the faint sounds of battle from a war movie playing on the TV. He wished so much that he could see the movie, but the cupboard, the hall and the lounge room doors were all between him and it.

A moment of unusually loud and raucous laughter from his cousin Dudley and his friends drowned out the gunfire and screams of the dying and brought a frown to his face. Harry swiped his hand through the air and all the little soldiers fell over as if he had touched them.

_'Harry...' _The faint whisper contained the hint of chastisement.

"But it's not fair. You said you could have fun when you were five." Harry's whine was as quiet as he could manage but it still was audible unlike the other voice. A voice only he could hear.

_'And what have I told you about things being fair?'_

"Nothing is fair. If the sit... sit you.. sit you shun looks fair it means you don't understand it?"

_'Situation. But yes, that's it. Well done Harry.'_

Harry smiled in the near darkness. His Aunt and Uncle never said anything like that. It was nice to have someone that said pleasant things to him. He felt that there was once someone else that said nice things to him but he couldn't really remember that. The voice said he used to have people that loved him but wouldn't tell him much about them. Always said he would tell him more as he grew up and could understand it better. Still he was glad to have his one friend even though he did so wish he could see him.

"Thanks Tom. Can you tell me another story of Hogwarts?"

_'Okay Harry, but first put the soldiers away... no, not like that, do it without touching them.'_

So after Harry Potter concentrated and with a raised hand sent the little soldiers floating up to their hiding place, the quiet voice entertained him with tales of his adventures and lessons at Hogwarts.

_-my-friend-tom-_

**Age 6**

If anyone had seen what food his relatives let him eat, they would wonder how Harry could look so well fed. He was below average in height but had more muscle definition than is usual for a boy of his age. His tanned skin gave evidence that he spent a lot of time outside. His clothes looked a little rough and unusual though they fitted well enough. Looking closely, people could see that they had been resized and patched a great many times.

Each day, Harry would awake as the sun rose and the first glimpses of its light entered the hall and were visible through the crack in the cupboard door. He would next think to himself "_Good morning Tom."_

And the reply would come just as unheard to anyone else, _'Good morning Harry.'_

Harry would open his cupboard, unlocking the unseen exterior locks with a wave of his hand and a thought. Quietly crawling out, he would enter the kitchen and prepare himself some toast, fruit and milk for breakfast. Some mornings Tom would quiz him as he ate, but usually the voice was silent. After breakfast he would quietly use the downstairs toilet, before crawling back into his cupboard to study his school books until his aunt came down to wake him. Then he would make them a rather unhealthy breakfast. If Harry was lucky, he would get a piece of toast or a single pancake but he didn't rightly care if he missed out.

He had long learned that doing his chores half heartedly was likely to end up with him missing meals, so he always made sure to eat enough whilst the Dursleys slept.

This morning started off no different. He had just finished reviewing the maths homework due Monday when Aunt Petunia descended the stairs – she at least didn't weigh as much as a hippo or purposefully stomp on each stair so no dust or spiders were dislodged. As she passed the cupboard she unlocked it, slapped the door and called out in her shrill voice "Wake up, boy. Stop dawdling, Dudley wants pancakes today."

_'Dudley is well on his way to becoming a giant Pancake.'_

Allowing himself a quick grin he called out in a carefully neutral voice, "Coming, Aunt Petunia."

Tom was always offering up little comments to cheer Harry up. Even though Harry was now quite practiced in keeping his emotions well concealed Tom still occasionally managed to get him to snigger or smile at inappropriate times. To Harry it was a fun game.

Vernon was next up, banging on Dudley's door and bellowing some inane saying about early birds before clomping his way down the stairs to sit heavily at the table. "Boy, get me the paper!"

Harry frowned at the half cooked pancake in front of him. If he finished cooking the pancake. Uncle Vernon would get angry for not doing what he was told quickly enough and he'd probably end up back in the cupboard for the rest of the day. Not how he wanted to spend such a nice day. However if he got the newspaper from the front yard right now, the pancake would burn and Aunt Petunia would be upset and would likely be the one to send him to the cupboard.

'_Those are not your only two options. You could also cast the stasis spell.'_

"_But they might catch me doing magic..."_

'_True, but there is often some element of risk with every choice.'_

"_So which should I do?"_

'_That is your decision, but I do recommend you decide quickly.'_

Harry took a deep breath and called out, "Okay, Uncle Vernon." He turned down the heat and as he turned towards the hall he made sure to have his back blocking the view from the dining area where his Uncle, Aunt and Cousin sat. He made a couple of very quick movements with his right hand, a circular wave and a gentle pat as he whispered the incantation.

He strode quickly into the hall and broke into a quiet sprint as soon as he was out of sight of the dining room. Of course the paper was in the middle of the rose bush again and, since there were neighbours around, he was forced to half climb into the bush to retrieve the rolled up paper. Still a few scratches were nothing if he could get away from the house today.

As he rushed to the table dropping off the paper next to Uncle Vernon's cup of thick black coffee his eyes happened to catch Dudley's. Instantly Harry was on the alert. Dudley was planning something.

'_Look deeper, Harry.'_

Harry focused and suddenly the world seemed first freeze then fade away. Dudley's thoughts were a mess, everything blurry and overlapping but there in the middle was a clear image of Harry tripping over Dudley's foot and Dudley pouring his glass of coke over Harry's head.

He withdrew and the world re-appeared and begun moving again. Harry skidded to a halt. Aunt Petunia's head rose up, suspicion evident in her eyes. Harry, thinking quickly, went around the other side of the table and picked up a few empty plates and took them into the Kitchen. "Hurry up boy. Don't you dare let any of that mixture burn."

A non-verbal finite and his stasis spell was gone. The pancake was saved.

'_Well done Harry. You handled that masterfully.'_

Harry wiped the smile from his face before serving the last pancakes. Aunt Petunia examined them carefully, frowning when she found nothing to complain about. She served out a few more to Dudley and Vernon before shoving the plate now holding just the smallest towards Harry, "That's yours, boy. Clean up and get out of here."

Uncle Vernon's head rose up at that and he was about to speak when Aunt Petunia explained, "Mrs Robert is coming over for lunch and I don't want the boy anywhere near."

"Right. You heard that, boy. Make yourself scarce and I'd better not see you anywhere near till dinner time, is that clear?"

Harry nodded and made sure his face showed no joy as cleaned up. He had cast his first spell in the presence of his relatives and they hadn't noticed.

An hour after leaving No. 4 Privet Drive, Harry was sitting cross legged in a hollow he had made amongst a few large bushes bordering the stream. His notice-me-not was very weak but since he was also well hidden he and Tom both thought it'd be good enough.

He had used some meditation techniques to calm his nerves. He suspected that the story he was going to learn was not going to be a happy one.

As always Tom spoke softly and clearly in his mind, though this time Harry picked up the very faint feeling of regret. It had taken Harry a long time to learn how to pick up on any emotion in Tom's voice, it was always so faint.

'_Okay Harry. As I promised, it's time to fill in the gaps in the stories I have told you over the past few years. I am sorry that it is not a happy story for either of us._

_I've already told you of how I, known then as Tom Riddle, grew up in an Orphanage and how until I went to Hogwarts I never knew real happiness. How, each time they sent me back there, I felt more and more betrayed by the magical world._

_I have also told you of the individual who called himself Lord Voldemort and waged a war of terror on the wizarding world until the night he attacked you and was badly wounded._

_I am sure you already suspect, but I am now going to confirm that Tom Riddle and Lord Voldemort were one and the same and that I am a part of that same soul. The person that attacked you as a baby and killed your parents._

_I am sorry Harry. I cannot excuse what my past self did. It was wrong and it was only after my soul split that last time that I was able to understand that.'_

Tom's voice went quiet as he let Harry absorb his words for a few minutes before continuing.

'_Now, I will tell you more about what I think happened when Lord Voldemort attacked you. Your parents had unknowingly given you a form of positive magical protection through their love and subsequent self sacrifice. I believe that such magic is a form of magical blessing and would be powerful enough to temporarily protect a young child from mundane dangers such as a fire, wild beast or accident. Maybe even help a lost baby be found. You could label it love, light or positive magic._

_However I don't think that such a magic shield can be a potent defence against wilful damage or magical threats, otherwise your circumstances wouldn't have been so unique. However another factor was at play by that time. Lord Voldemort had attempted time and time again to build his strength and ensure his immortality by the darkest of spells and rituals. The worst of these made him much less than human and weakened his defences against exactly that type of magic that was protecting you._

_Now it gets even more confusing._

_When Lord Voldemort used a killing curse fuelled by pure hate and fear, I believe it was that shield of positive magic that caused it to fail so spectacularly. The remaining part of Lord Voldemort's soul was very nearly destroyed at that time and he was only able to survive by redirecting most of the magical backlash into his physical body and Armando Dippet's silver walking stick, destroying them both in the process._

_At the same time Lord Voldemort was fighting for his very existence, I was created. The fragment of soul that I am was already mostly divided from his soul through various dark rituals. I was the last remnant of Lord Voldemort's humanity and he wished to shed that and use me as one more anchor to this realm. The walking stick was supposed to be my home for the rest of eternity. However with the walking stick destroyed, it seemed that the ritual took hold of the next most suitable vessel and pushed me into it. You were that vessel, Harry._

_Somewhere, Lord Voldemort's soul remains, likely still damaged but able to slowly rebuild itself and regain his magic. Faster, if he can find a willing magical host and allies. When he is strong enough he will return, he will seek dominance, and he will try to finish what he started.'_

Harry's was having trouble taking it all in but he understood that well enough, "He will kill me?"

'_No Harry, he will try to kill you. But you have advantages he knows not. For one thing, he won't believe that part of his soul could exist within you, and for any other fragment that would be true. But I am unlike the others and I will help you. I have only two desires now and they are to make amends for what I have done and to finally move on. I will teach you how to free all of us fragments of our bindings so that together with Lord Voldemort's soul we will depart. The others will not go willingly but you are strong Harry, and you will have friends. I know you may not believe me, but when you get to Hogwarts it will be different there. Even I, in my younger years at Hogwarts, had friends. It was only by the third year that there was no longer any that I would call friend, just followers. That was when he stopped being Tom Riddle and started becoming Lord Voldemort in his own mind._

_Those were the last secrets I have kept from you, Harry. So, as promised, apart from spells that you are either not ready for or that no one should know, I will keep nothing from you. You may now ask any questions that you wish and I will do my best to answer honestly.'_

Another long pause before Harry asked in a whisper, "I think I understand but why did he kill my parents?"

'_He had heard of a prophecy about one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaching. Presuming that the Dark Lord mentioned was himself, he took the rest of what he heard to indicate yourself and decided to do his best to make sure the prophecy failed. Of course, as with most prophecies, putting stock in them gives them power and it was his own actions that led to his downfall._

_Your parents, their friends and their allies learnt he was looking for you and did their best to protect you. Unfortunately, the one they entrusted with the secret to their most powerful protection was weak willed and easily swayed with promises of power. Your parents died because they loved and wanted to protect you. However unlike the many tens of thousand others that died in those dark years your parents' death was not in vain, and I am sure that they, wherever they are now, are happy that you lived.'_

Harry thought long and hard before saying anything more, "Thank you, Tom, for telling me."

'_You are welcome, Harry.'_

"So, can you tell me about the bits of soul again?"

* * *

_**Update 13 July**: Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter and helping me overcome my fear of comma's._


	2. Chapter 2 - Friends and Letters

_**Author Notes:** Thanks for the reviews. Not sure what classifies as slow updates. Aiming for at least once a week but I make no promises. _

_**Update 14 July**: Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter and fixing the numerous errors._

* * *

**Chapter 2 - Friends and Letters**

* * *

**Age 8**

It was a typical morning and Harry trailed behind Dudley as they walked to school. After a few blocks they met up with Piers, who was waiting on his porch with his mother.

"Dudley."

"Piers. Good Morning, Mrs Polkiss."

"Good Morning, Dudley. Okay love, have a good day and don't forget to hand in your homework."

"Okay mum, bye!"

"Goodbye, Mrs Polkiss,"

No one greeted or even looked at Harry. He didn't care, as this was normal and pretty much the same thing happened when they were joined by Malcolm, another of Dudley's brutish friends.

Malcolm grimaced when entering the school yard and Harry passed close by him. Ever since those two times Malcolm had gone temporarily blind for a half a day, he hadn't spoken to Harry. That the first time had happened not long after Malcolm had pushed Harry off a swing and the second time after he had kicked sand in Harry's face, he hadn't told anyone. He was sure he had seen a reddish glint in Harry's eyes when the kid had glared at him. Malcolm had just laughed, but it was only a few minutes later that he had started having trouble seeing. The doctors hadn't been able to find anything wrong with his eyes and everyone had just been so relieved that it hadn't lasted long each time. Still, Malcolm now had to go to the eye specialist every few months for checkups just in case.

In class, Harry sat in the front corner, closest to Gordon. Another of Dudley's friends and another of the kids that avoided Harry. Harry smiled pleasantly and said "Good Morning, Gordon. Guess what, my Aunt gave me corned beef sandwiches for lunch again today." Gordon just frowned and shook his head before looking away. He had been hospitalized for a week with severe stomach cramps after he last stole Harry's lunch.

Monday started off with Maths so everyone started off by handing in their homework. Harry knew he was going to get 63% for his and that Dudley was going to get 68%. He always aimed for somewhere between 55% and 75% and usually didn't check on Dudley's homework, but teacher parent interviews were coming up so he wanted to make sure he was on track. Harry smiled to himself as he considered that it was actually more effort to get these tests wrong than it would be to get them right. His smile turned into a thoughtful frown as he wondered why he bothered anymore, since he was pretty sure neither his Aunt nor his Uncle would make that big of a deal about it if he did better than Dudley now.

He put his thoughts into words in his mind, _"Why don't I start doing better? Petunia and Vernon wouldn't say anything."_

Tom's reply came quickly, _'That is true__,__ but you could still consider it practice for presenting the desired image.'_

"_But wouldn't it be more of a challenge to change my image? Everyone already sees me as a fairly stupid loner who enjoys jogging. It's not really much of a challenge keeping that image but to change it without making anyone suspicious would be."_

This time Tom's reply was slower and more thoughtful, _'Humm. That is true. How about whilst you continue to ignore your teacher you tell me what kind of new image you want to present and how you would go about changing yourself to match.'_

That night Harry sat in his bedroom with a number of books on education, psychology and personality types and started making notes and writing lists. There was a lot to plan.

_-my-friend-tom-_

**Age 10**

Harry found his new personality much more enjoyable. For one thing he now had friends. His chosen friends were not taken from the local suburban dregs, as Tom frequently referred to them. Instead his new friends were a tall weedy boy with a lisp who had a unique way of handling maths problems, a musically talented west indian and a creative, quiet and chubby bookworm. Most of the kids followed Duddley's lead in referring to them as either 'them' or, if they were feeling particularly brave and none of 'them' were near, as 'the rejects'. To their face everyone was unfailingly polite, it had taken awhile but Harry was proud of his accomplishment that now even new kids to the school usually got the message from the other students without him having to lift a finger. No one bothered Harry or his friends.

However Tom, never shy with his opinions, wasn't that impressed by Harry's friends. _Remember they are just muggles__,__ Harry. You can't teach wingless birds to fly. Don't let yourself get too attached.'_

"_You don't want me to have friends?"_

'_That's not it and you know it. I just want to make sure you find worthwhile friends. True friends are loyal, will keep your secrets, and stand by you when you need them to. Muggles just aren't capable of that.'_

"_Aren't capable? You mean they won't?"_

'_I meant what I said__,__ Harry. You'll find many muggles and even wizards that certainly won't but that's not what I am talking about. These muggle friends could believe themselves the most loyal friends in the world but__,__ being muggles__,__ it would a moment's effort for even an average wizard to turn them against you and steal your secrets from them.'_

"_Is there no way to protect them?" _the tone of Harry's internal voice expressed his concern.

'_Not well. Enchanted necklaces and earrings can be taken off. Wards only protect those within them. Charms can be easily dispelled by those more powerful or worn down over time. The best defence for them is not to be near wizards.'_

"_So when I go to Hogwarts I won't be able to see them again__.__"_

There was a brief pause as Tom considered his answer, _'No, you just have to be careful. Once you arrive at Hogwarts__,__ the chances that you won't have tracking charms cast on you are slim to none. That means someone will be able to find you a lot easier from then on. They could be removed with a wand but when you pass through into Diagon Alley or into Hogwarts__,__ the Trace Charm is going to be cast on you or be refreshed. That means anytime you cast wanded magic outside Hogwarts alarms will go off. Without assistance the only way I know to get around this is to learn how to bypass the trace, not at easy task.'_

"_Can you teach me how to bypass the trace?"_

'_I can teach you the theory but we will have to wait till your magic is more mature before I we can even work out if it's within your power. Not everyone can achieve it__,__ though I suspect you won't have any trouble once you are experienced enough.'_

_-my-friend-tom-_

Similar to how he was treated at school, at number four Privet Drive Harry was either treated with forced politeness or simply ignored. His Uncle and Aunt had also learned that things went a lot smoother when Harry was treated well. Even Dudley had learned to keep his distance though it took him a lot longer to learn and he still couldn't resist the occasional snide comment. Harry had given up on trying to train Dudley beyond that. Some techniques require the trainee to have some measure of intelligence.

Harry still got up early but only to study and exercise, he no longer needed to make himself separate meals whilst the rest of the house slept. He had fallen into a comfortable schedule in the kitchen where he cooked brunch on the weekends, and dinners three times a week. He made his own healthier breakfasts and lunches on the weekdays. He also looked after the vegetable garden and weeded Petunia's rose gardens once a week. All the other housework was done by Aunt Petunia. Vernon and Dudley mostly just prevented the lounge room furniture from escaping.

Weekends were spent mostly outdoors talking to Tom. Harry had developed a keen interest in history. He had learnt everything he could of magical and muggle history prior to 1981 from Tom before moving on to library books to fill his knowledge of muggle history. He had high hopes for the library at Hogwarts. He had learnt Latin and Greek from Tom though it had taken him a long time to get the spoken pronouncement anywhere close to correct, spoken pronunciation was somehow different from thought translation. He had had an easier time with French that he had taken as an optional evening class through school. Now that Harry wasn't concealing his abilities and with Tom's sometimes incessant tutoring he was now top of his year in Mathematics and Science. Tom had taken it further by giving him a decent start on third and fourth year arithmancy. Harry wished to learn even more but many concepts were difficult to grasp without the correct reference books and tools.

Though Tom had kept to his promise to answer all Harry's questions not related to the darkest of magic, occasionally he did strongly advise Harry that some topics were best left unexplored. Still he fulfilled his promise and when Harry ignored Tom's advice and demanded that he be told the whole truth about one of Lord Voldemort's encounters with the aurors, Tom did tell Harry everything in excruciating detail. The nightmares did fade with time and, afterwards, Harry respected Tom's advice that much more.

Even though Harry now had three close friends and Tom, a feeling of loneliness was growing within him. There were so many things he couldn't tell his school mates and he still didn't even know what Tom looked like. He had gone so far as to try sketching a face with Tom's advice. The picture turned out half decent, but Tom had admitted it didn't really look like him. He had never even spoke to another wizard, though he had seen a few over the years and they had obviously recognized him. One had shaken his hand, another had bowed and one had waved, but none of them had said anything before vanishing. It was strange though, Tom said it was because he was still obviously younger than Hogwarts' school age.

Tom thought that the actions of the wizards indicated that now was a time of relative peace but, until the wizarding world contacted Harry around his eleventh birthday, it was best to remain cautious. Since neither of them had any idea who had left Harry with the Dursleys - Tom had no recollection of anything but pain and confusion for the first few months after the split and having Harry question his Aunt or Uncle meant they would be left with memories of such questions - Tom had recommended he also keep a low profile till they knew more.

Tom was sure that Hogwarts would send Harry a letter this Summer and frequently reassured Harry of the fact. Today was another of those days.

'_Don't worry, Harry. Someone will likely turn up with your letter since you have been raised by muggles. In my time it was Dumbledore though, since he became Headmaster, it'll likely be by another teacher. They typically give you a week from when they sent the letter to reply.'_

"_What happens if they don't send a letter, Tom? Would I have to go to Smeltings?"_

'_Even if you didn't go to Hogwarts, there are other schools. We could easily arrange something.'_

"_But I have no money."_

'_You worry too much, Harry. I've already told you that it's likely your parents left you something. Even if they knew about it, your Aunt and Uncle couldn't touch it. It's quite a common custom for wizarding parents to prepare for their students' education even before their birth. If not, well, I know ways of getting money.'_

"_You mean steal?"_

'_During a war it's raiding, not stealing. The wizarding world has no concept of peace or truce. Lord Voldemort started the war and until he is truly dead then the war is not over. If it makes you feel better, then his minions have no moral right to the loot that they horde anyhow. Another way of looking at it is that it's actually my money and I'd just be repossessing it. Semantics, Harry, are less important than solving the big problems. Be assured I'll do my best to make sure your soul remains untainted. Still, we needn't worry about that right now. Later, when you are stronger and have allies, it would be a good idea to weaken his support base. You do recall what I told you about the war and why Lord Voldemort was so successful?'_

"_He used fear and his Ministry's own laws against them?"_

'_Indeed. He fought from the darkness, hid his true numbers, and used money, lies, spies and mistrust to breed confusion and terror. He did his best to hobble the Aurors so they had powers barely above that of the common Hit-Wizard. They were trained and instructed to capture whilst Lord Voldemort trained his Death Eaters to maim and kill. Stupify is fine in a one on one battle or police action, but not in a war. You need a direct hit and it's easily countered.''_

"_Which is why I should use Confringo, Expulso, Bombarda or Reducto as my primary attacks."_

'_Correct, Harry. Those spells are useful against individuals, multiple opponents and even creatures but are unlikely to kill a wizard unless overpowered and, since they are not considered dark, won't stain your soul nor reputation. Remember, a follow up curse and disarming your opponent is still advisable. Often a victim of one of the blasting curses will only be temporarily stunned and the more powerful wizards will recover quickly. Even broken legs can be quickly ignored or patched if you can stand the pain.'_

"_Are you trying to distract me from talking about my Hogwarts letter?"_

'_You know me too well, Harry. Anyhow, it's getting close to your birthday, I wouldn't be surprised if something happens then if not earlier.'_

"_Okay. Thanks Tom. I'll try not to worry about it."_

_-my-friend-tom-_

The letter Harry had been fearing would never arrive came the following morning. Harry recognised it straight away from Tom's description and tucked it away under his shirt. Later, he and Tom had a little fun writing his reply.

Walking outside wondering how he was going to return the letter, he spotted an owl sitting in a nearby tree so he quickly returned inside to get the letter. As he tied it to the owl's leg, he apologised, "I'm sorry I don't have anything for you at the moment, but I'll do my best to find something for you when you return."

* * *

Dear Deputy Headmistress,

Thank you for your letter. I would be very keen to accept your invitation to attend your school, as it does answer some of the strange things that have happened to me over the past few years.

However, I know very little about the wizarding community and I am unsure on matters such as how to go about purchasing the required uniform, course books and equipment. Nor am I sure how much such will cost, nor what the school fees are, as I have very little money available. Is there such a thing as a student loan available that I can pay off once I graduate?

My last question is what are the school hours and what options are there for transport to and from the school? I don't see any information on the location of the school and am unsure just how long a commute it will be.

Regards,  
Harry Potter

* * *

The owl returned a few hours later and found Harry sitting in the park, his eyes closed as he discussed the different houses and Tom's feelings about them. Harry smiled as the owl landed on the bench beside him. The owl's eye focused in on the small cardboard box that sat on the ground near Harry's foot. After taking the letter Harry kicked the box over and the mouse hidden within took off. It made it only a few feet before the owl caught it.

Harry sniggered as the owl ducked its head at him before flying off to a nearby tree with its meal. Then he opened and read the letter.

* * *

Dear Mr. Potter,

Sadly, I was unaware of your lack of knowledge of Hogwarts and the wizarding world. However, let me inform you that Hogwarts is a boarding school and that I will be at your disposal in regard to any questions you have regarding the wizarding world. To get you started, I have enclosed an information pack primarily aimed at muggleborns for your perusal.

I have also been advised by the Headmaster that he will arrange one of our staff to visit you tomorrow morning at nine and escort you to Diagon Alley to shop for your school suppliers. He will also bring a key so you can access your vault at Gringotts, the wizarding bank, where you will find that you have adequate funds for your education.

If tomorrow is not suitable please reply with an alternative time, otherwise please be ready to meet our representative tomorrow.

Minerva McGonagall,  
Deputy Headmistress

* * *

'_Interesting. It seems that at least the Deputy Headmistress is keen to see you integrated with the wizarding society. Still, you must keep your wits about you tomorrow. It would be wise to make a good first impression. I did not, though as it turns out the impression I gave turned out to be sadly quite accurate.'_

"_So tomorrow I will get everything I need?"_

'_I would focus on tomorrow being the day you get a feel for the wizarding world more than anything. Don't get anything that indicates more than passing knowledge of the wizarding world. Follow the advice of the staff member, likely one of the Heads of Houses, and keep your eyes open. Once we know the lay of the land, it should be easy enough to visit another day under a glamour and pick up anything else you need.'_

"_Okay, sounds good. So back to what we were talking about. The sorting hat will look into my mind and decide on the best House from me, but I maybe able to get a chance to influence it. Will it see you?"_

There was a long pause though Harry could somehow tell that Tom was pondering the question rather than planning not to answer, _'That's an intriguing question. I hadn't considered that and I am not sure I can answer it. It may be best that I hide for the duration of the sorting, just in case. During my time, the sorting hat told be it could not reveal any of the students' secrets. However, I have no way of knowing if that was the truth or if exceptions exist. I suggest it's time we review your Occlumency walls.'_

Harry sighed and spoke aloud, "Now I wish I hadn't asked..."


	3. Chapter 3 - Diagon Alley

_**Author Notes:** Thanks for the reviews. _

_**Update 14 July**: Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter and fixing the numerous errors._

* * *

**_Chapter 3 - Diagon Alley_**

* * *

The following morning, Harry was standing on the front lawn of No. 4 Privet Drive when he heard a faint crack from the small park just down the way. It was soon followed by the sound of someone knocking over a rubbish bin and a muffled grunt. Next, a massive figure roughly brushing rubbish off his long dirty overcoat strode into view. When he spotted Harry, a broad smile lit up the giant's face and his huge steps quickly ate up the distance between them until he towered above Harry.

"Wow, Harry. You sure grew up. Last I saw ya you were just a wee fella who loved ta climb." The man's voice boomed so loud that nearby windows shook and Harry was sure that it would be only a matter of moments before the neighbours were all peering out. So much for waiting outside to try and keep the meeting low key.

"Eh.. Hello. I'm sorry but I don't really remember you."

"Ahh dat be right. Just like yesterday for me but for you yeah... So I'm Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts and I'm here to take ya shopping. Tis nice to meet you again anyhows Harry."

He held out a massive arm and shook Harry's hand hard enough so that Harry almost fell over. The big man barely noticed as he was now looking around the street.

"What a strange place you live, eh? They all look the same. Weird, these muggles. So, all ready then? Go tell ya Uncle and Aunty we going?"

"Already told them, thanks, Mr Hagrid." Harry hadn't and wasn't planning to. He certainly didn't want his Aunt and Uncle forgetting their place and going off on one of their rants.

"None of that. Just call me Hagrid, Harry. Everyone does. So we gonna get the muggle train there, but you can get the Knight Bus back. You'll need ya wand to call it and since.. well.. anyhow, enough of that. You know the way to the station, Harry?"

"Eh... Yes. I've been there before."

They started walking towards the station, with Hagrid exclaiming at all sorts of normal things as if they were the weirdest things he had ever seen.

Tom explained, _'Hagrid's probably spent little or no time in the muggle world. I'm unsure why Dumbledore would send him. From his comment about the knight bus he's still not a qualified wizard as you need a wand to summon it. Sadly, his being unqualified is my fault. Hagrid isn't very bright but he would have got through to at least owl levels except that in my seventh year I got him expelled to cover up one of my many crimes.'_

The train trip was fairly uneventful apart from all the strange looks that the ten foot high man received. Harry made small talk with Hagrid about Hogwarts and his work. He didn't learn anything new, but he actually did enjoy chatting with him.

Hagrid led the way from the station to the Leaky Cauldron. Harry's eyes were everywhere. He had been told many stories of London, the Leaky Cauldron and Diagon Alley but words did none of them justice. London was impressive, the Leaky Cauldron was even more grubby than he expected and Diagon Alley was just amazing. He barely noticed all the attention he garnered on the way through the tavern, he automatically shook hands and exchanged meaningless platitudes with the half dozen people having a late breakfast, before he exited on the heels of Hagrid.

The alley was very quiet, with only a few people wandering around and many shops still yet to open. Gringotts was impressive, though Hagrid didn't enjoy the cart ride near as much as Harry did. They gathered a few handfuls of galleons and then briefly stopped by another vault so Hagrid could retrieve something, before heading back to the main hall. Tom reminded Harry to refrain from asking questions to the Goblins at this time. If things went well, he would have ample opportunity later.

Just as they arrived back amongst the tellers a voice called out, "Hagrid. A moment of your time please."

A surprised Hagrid turned and waved as he half led half dragged Harry along behind him, "Eh. Hello, Professor. Wasn't expecting to see you here. That a muggleborn you have there?"

It was a tall stern looking lady with black hair and dark grey robes that had addressed Hagrid, "Indeed this young lady is Miss Hermione Granger and these are her parents. Mr and Mrs Granger, and that young fellow there must be young Mr Harry Potter."

Harry wasn't sure but he thought he detected a moment of mild frustration in Mr Granger's expression when he was introduced.

"That's right. Harry dis ere is Professor McGonagall. Deputy Headmistress and head of Gryffindor house and she'll be teaching ya Transfiguration."

"Pleasure to meet you Professor McGonagall." Harry was polite though he was more interested in looking around at the goblins.

'_Harry, it'll be no coincidence that she is here. She knew when Hagrid was bringing you. I suggest you pay more attention to her and her companions.'_

"Eh.. and hello Mr Granger, Mrs Granger, Miss Granger." He shook the hands of Mr Granger but just ducked his head at the lady and young girl. Now that he was paying attention, he noticed the youngest had bushy brown hair and was wearing a neat little grey dress and jacket. Something a little more suited to someone a bit older, but Harry thought she pulled it off okay with her straight backed posture. She was obviously a little out of her depth, but holding up well under the pressure.

"Mr Potter, a pleasure.", they each intoned in sequence which almost sent Harry into a fit of giggles he only just managed to stifle in time, only the young girl having picked up on it. Though she tried to pull of a slightly disapproving look, he spotted the smile in her eyes.

"Well, Professor, I've just taken Harry here down to his vault and we're about to do some shopping..."

"Excellent, Hagrid. I have just assisted the Grangers in exchanging some muggle money and we are about to do likewise. Please lead the way." Professor McGonagall glanced at Harry briefly and he was sure that there was a tinge of amusement in her eyes as she fell in beside him. As they followed the flustered Hagrid out of the bank she continued in a softer voice. "Well, Mr Potter I do hope you will be around long enough that you can join myself and the Grangers for lunch?"

"Minerva... Professor.. since you ere ya wouldn't mind if I, like, went and... ran another errand whilst Harry here gets fitted for his robes?" Hagrid was acting rather nervous around the much shorter Deputy Headmistress, which brought a grin to Harry's face. Hermione also grinned though not having seen Hagrid eyeing the taps in the Leaky Cauldron earlier probably didn't quite pick up the full reason for Professor McGonagall's disapproving glare, curt nod and then rolled eyes as he turned away.

Inside Madam Malkin's, Professor McGonagall took the two older Grangers aside whilst Hermione and Harry were measured up for their robes.

"So Harry, are you also muggleborn?" Hermione was putting in an effort to make her tone as casual as possible though there was still an nervous undercurrent.

"Not really. My parents were both wizards but they died and I was raised by my Aunt and Uncle. They are both muggles so I guess you could say I am muggle-raised."

"Ohh, sorry... my condolences."

"It's okay."

As the two ladies finished their measurements and went to check out the racks of robes Hermione asked, "Harry. Why did they keep looking at you so strangely? Did you notice? It was a bit weird, I thought. I think people..."

Harry smiled and held up a hand to stop the torrent of words, "Relax, Hermione. Let me answer your question first." The smile faded as he continued, "I've been getting those looks all day. It seems that when the last Dark Lord fell, it was due to an accident whilst he was trying to kill me just after killing my parents. So somehow I've been labeled a hero because of it."

Hermione opened her mouth to ask a question, closed it, reopened it paused again all in a manner of a few seconds before finally saying, "I'm sorry... I shouldn't have asked."

"Don't be silly, Hermione. You didn't know and it's before I can remember anyhow. I'd much prefer to be asked like you did, than have everyone already think they know what happened, which seems to be the case. I've already been thanked for defeating Lord Voldemort a dozen times this morning."

There was a pair of gasps behind them as the two ladies were returning with the robes.

Harry rolled his eyes at Hermione, "Oh, yeah. Most people don't like to use his name. They all go around calling him You-Know-Who."

"You-know-who? Why?"

'_I like this girl. Maybe a bit talkative at times but she does tend to get straight to the point.'_

Harry smiled and as they walked to the two changing cubicles replied, "Lord Voldemort ruled mostly by fear and.."

'_Harry. Other people can hear. Remember how much you are supposed to know.'_

"... and I guess they are still scared." Harry flicked his eyes back in the direction that the two ladies were waiting hoping that Hermione would get the message. A small nod seemed to indicate that she did.

"_Can I tell her more, Tom?"_

'_Of course, but I would be careful of your timing. She seems intelligent and, if she learns that today is supposed to be your first contact with the world, she might wonder how you know so much. She might ask the wrong person and make them suspicious. Might I suggest you wait till you've had time to read some books or talk to other people a bit more before you say too much more?'_

"_That makes sense. Thanks, Tom,"_

'_You are welcome, Harry. You are doing well.'_

As the robes were adjusted, their conversation turned to the primary schools they had attended, favourite subjects, friends and hobbies. Harry soon picked up that Hermione didn't have many friends. She reminded him a lot of his bookworm friend, though they were some significant differences. For one thing, Hermione was a girl. He wasn't too amused by Tom's ribbing regarding this and he couldn't avoid blushing a few times. He wondered if maybe he shouldn't have asked Tom those questions about girls. Tom was a little too honest and he felt he was far too young to think about Hermione like Tom suggested.

At the next shop, they each purchased a trunk. With a little convincing, Hagrid allowed Harry to splurge a little and get one with a reducio/engorgio charm permanently applied. Hermione picked up a trunk with an expansion charm on a small foldout bookcase. Both had permanent featherlight charms applied.

Their conversation was on favourite foods until they got to Flourish and Blotts and Hermione's attention was lost to the thousands of books about subjects she had never seen before. Harry focused on the school books he needed, though he also grabbed a couple of books that covered prominent families and recent events, spending quite a bit extra to get the self updating versions where available. Following Tom's advice, he also made sure he and Hermione picked up a book of wizarding etiquette and customs saying, "Something tells me that we are both going to have to treat this culture as if we were living in a land just as foreign as Japan."

Hermione spent much of the following hour looking around and watching wizards with an often thoughtful expression.

No one enjoyed much of their experience at Ollivander's, though Harry and Hermione were both happy when they finally found their wands. They were all quite happy to move on to Eeylops Owl Emporium, where Hagrid bought Harry an early birthday present of a beautiful Snowy Owl and Hermione a Cinnamon Screech Owl, since he felt a little guilty about only buying Harry a present when it wasn't even his birthday. Mrs Granger attempted to refuse but Hagrid wasn't having any of it and Hermione had already fallen in love with the little owl. Harry named his owl Hedwig and Hermione named hers Athene.

After they were forced to move to a private room for lunch because of the boy-who-lived fans, Professor McGonagall gave a brief account of the events of ten years ago to explain the strange behaviour of people around Harry. A few more condolences were given before the conversation moved on to Hogwarts, electives and careers.

"Well, yes, Divination is also a choice and if you do happen to be a true seer it could be useful. Otherwise, you are likely to discover that it is infact one of the more imprecise branches of magic. Professor Trelawney has been our Divination Professor for the past ten years. She would be the person to speak to about the subject. I would suggest you wait till at least second year before you start trying to make a decision on what electives to take."

"Oh. What about the Houses, Professor, which were you in?"

"Well I was in Gryffindor and am currently the Head of that House but please don't let that influence you, all the Houses have their own noble history and each have produced outstanding wizards and witches."

Hagrid snorted sending pieces of his pie across the table. After he apologised and had begun wiping them up he muttered, "Not Slytherin."

Professor McGonagall glared at Hagrid, "Yes, even Slytherin. Whilst it is true that Slytherin House has gained an unfortunate reputation of producing more than its fair share of dark wizards, there are numerous examples where it has produced fine wizards. Such as our notable previous Potions Master Professor Slughorn. Even Merlin was a member of the house of Salazar Slytherin."

Hagrid muttered again, "That's not many."

Professor McGonagall glared at Hagrid again, but didn't offer a correction.

'_He's right, you know. It used to be a fine house but it had already been tainted by the dark before I went to Hogwarts and, after I left, it was a breeding ground for evil wizards. Unless Dumbledore has really put his foot down, I doubt it has changed. He certainly didn't achieve much whilst Lord Voldemort was in power.'_

As they went downstairs from their private dining room, Hermione confided to Harry, "I hope I get into Gryffindor. They sound like the doers. People that change things for the better, not just learn about them. Stil,l Ravenclaw would be okay I guess."

"Wherever you end up I hope I end up there as well." Harry's reply brought a blush to Hermione's face.

'_Very smooth Harry, she certainly liked that.'_

Harry hid his face as he started blushing as well. The adults, chatting as they led the way down the stairs, didn't notice.

After lunch, there was only a few more stops to pick up their potion making equipment, dragonhide gloves and telescopes. Hagrid was by this time slurring a bit, as he had partaken of rather a large amount of his usual whilst chatting with Mr. Granger about magical creatures. He had even promised to send him a few teeth of magical creatures he had collected over the years with the admonishment, "Really not supposed to give em to muggles but you got Hermione and long you don't go showing em to anyone where's the harm in that, eh?" Hagrid's nudge had almost knocked Mr Granger off his chair.

All too soon, Harry and Hermione were saying goodbye and promising to write over the rest of the summer. Harry had advised Hermione on how to send an Owl so that it didn't disturb his Uncle or Aunt. After Professor McGonagall had taken the Grangers to their car and apparated away, Hagrid led Harry to a small side street in muggle London, "This here be the best place to call the Knight Bus. So off you go. I'll be taking the Floo back to Hogsmeade."

Harry reached for his wand and then paused, "Hagrid, I forgot to get some money changed to pounds. I'll do that first and then I'll catch the Knight Bus. It's okay I know how to get back here now. Thanks for all your help Hagrid, it's been brilliant!"

"Eh, okay then, Harry. Here I'll walk you back into the Leaky Cauldron. It's been a real pleasure to meet up with ya again after all this time. You so much like ya parents. You take care of yourself and I'll see you on the 1st." Hagrid had a tear in his eye as he waved to Harry before entering the largest fireplace.

Harry smiled and absentmindedly shook a few more hands as he headed back to Diagon Alley. As he left the tavern, he put a wandless glamour on to change the colour of his hair and hide his glasses and scar. That seemed to do the trick as no one else approached him as he headed to Gringotts. He was glad that it at least worked on magical folk unlike a lot of his other wandless spells.

At Gringotts, Harry started with "Excuse me sir. I need to speak to someone about the state of my accounts and to also change some galleons for pounds." and soon had learnt a few interesting things about his inheritance. He left rather frustrated, but with copies of all the information that might be useful later; it looked like it was going to be many years before he could change or fix anything without the permission of his guardians and there was no way he wanted the Dursleys getting involved in any of this. He did however withdraw some more galleons and have a fair number converted to pounds before leaving.

'_Clear your mind, Harry. Take those feelings and put them away. No, don't lock them away just push them to the side. Locking them away is not a good long term solution, I learnt that the hard way. Remember, we didn't expect anything better and I'm impressed you held your temper and remained polite to the goblins. It's good practice for when you deal with wizards who will be even less honest.'_

Harry took a moment to collect himself and then considered Tom's words for a moment, _"Shouldn't I be polite to the goblins anyhow?_"

Tom gave a mental shrug, _'There is really no point. They are so regulated and law bound by the ministry and their own laws and oaths, it makes no difference how you act. As long as you follow their rules they have to follow theirs.'_

"_But there is no reason to not be polite right?"_

'_No, I guess not. If you wish to expend the effort, that's your choice.'_

His next task, getting his eyes fixed, turned out to be surprisingly easy if one was willing to spend the money and could stand the pain. A potion, a few minutes of agony, and it was all fixed. He had the lens on his glasses converted to plain ones with just the common long lasting impervious, unbreakable and night vision charms. He wondered how many of the wizards wearing glasses he had seen had enchantments added.

'_All of them, I would say, Harry. Money is rarely a concern for most wizarding families. When I was at Hogwarts I attempted to discern what enchantments exist on Dumbledore's glasses but my spells often got conflicting readings. Either his are more powerful than any I have ever read about, or he has many pairs that looked identical but have different enchantments.'_

Next, he picked up a moleskin book bag with an expansion charm and locking charm so only he could access the contents. That cost even more than the eye repair potion. He moved all his non school books over to that. Then, he went back to Flourish and Blotts and picked up a large collection of books that Tom suggested would be useful. A few that had been published recently, but most just containing things that either Tom was unfamiliar with or had forgotten.

Tom had admitted that though he had gained a copy of Lord Voldemort's memories at the time of the split, it was not eidetic. Like most wizards, Tom knew some spells very well and many others only half as well. It was unlikely that his selection of spells would be that well suited to Harry. Harry searched, but ended up rather frustrated by the lack of information on wandless magic, even though Tom had warned him that was likely to be the case.

'_Even if there was such a book, Harry it would likely be useless. Wandless magic is so individual that apart from listing examples of the few wizards capable of it, there is little that could be written about it. Already, you are able to achieve a few things with it that I never achieved. Likewise some of my previous abilities will probably be unsuited to you. It's up to you to work out if there is anything else you are capable of.'_

On that sour note Harry left Diagon Alley and went muggle shopping. His main target was new clothing, but there were plenty of other little things he wanted to make his life easier. Modern star charts, astrological calendars, boxes of index cards and more stationary soon joined his more magical purchases in his book bag.

Harry used a glamour to disguise his features and add a few years to ensure he wasn't bothered when he took the Knight bus back to No. 4 Privet Drive.

'_So Harry, think you will dream of Hermione tonight?'_

"_Quiet you."_


	4. Chapter 4 - Hermione

_**Author Notes: **Thanks to all the readers and reviewers. Answers/replies to questions and comments are/will be posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/_

_****__**Update 14 July**: __Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter._

___**Update 17 September**: Hermione's mum is Emma Granger and will no longer be changing names between chapters._

* * *

_**Chapter 4 - Hermione**_

* * *

The next few weeks of summer passed too quickly for Harry's liking. He had been looking forward to going to Hogwarts for so long, he was surprised to find himself now wishing he had more time to prepare. There was so much to learn and Tom had all but forbid him to just sit indoors and read.

'_You must exercise more, Harry. The rituals I used to improve my physical strength and reflexes are either dark or unattainable to you at the present time. You certainly don't want to end up looking like Dudley, do you?'_

It was that last thought that had Harry putting time each morning into jogging and shadow boxing. He also added in stretches and a few aerobic activities between study sessions. A few mental exercises and some muscle healing spells allowed him to push himself pretty hard.

'_Most wizards depend on their magic to keep their body healthy and, for most, that's enough. Even an elderly wizard can move like the lightning if they have a strong connection to their magic. However, even those reflexes can be improved by physical conditioning, which is why Aurors have to undertake physical training.'_

"_But you didn't do that, did you, Tom?"_

'_No. Initially I depended purely on magical power and later, as Lord Voldemort, dark rituals were used to steal the physical strength of victims, which he shared with the Death Eaters. However, I don't suggest that avenue for you.'_

"_Hell no. I'll do my exercises."_

'_Humm.. That reminds me, I think we need to work on your swearing. I might be providing less than a perfect role example.'_

He told Hermione in one of his letters that he was exercising and was pleasantly surprised, when for his birthday, she sent him a pair of rather good self help fitness books along with a box of absolutely delicious cookies. The exercises within the books alleviated much of the boredom of his previous program. With Tom's advice, he recommended her a couple of books on Occlumency, toting their benefit to memory and mental agility rather than its defence against Legilimency. That and his introducing the world of owl ordering to her, was surely met with squeals of delight if the tone of her '_thank you, thank you, thank you'_ letter was any indication.

However his favourite letter from Hermione was the third one she sent.

* * *

Dear Harry,

Thank you again for telling me about those books. I read all the introductory chapters and started on the exercises. It's hard work, but it's going to be so useful. I have completed the first three exercises, but I'm having a lot of problems on the fourth. Do you think I should choose a different object to visualise than a book? It was one of the examples, but everytime I do the exercise I find myself trying to see what the title of the book is.

I want to tell you something strange that I remembered last night. When Professor McGonagall picked me up she told me that it was customary for all muggleborn students and their families to be introduced to the wizarding world and escorted to Diagon Alley by either the Deputy Headmaster/Headmistress or one of the House leaders. However, Hagrid told us that he was the Keeper of the Keys and Grounds. I know it's an important position since according to a History of Hogwarts he's one of the few that can open up the wards to allow magical creatures and races access to Hogwarts. But he's not a House leader nor even a professor. Do you think that was strange? He was nice but I'm not sure he was responsible enough to be given such a task. What do you think?

Also, do you have any idea when his birthday might be? I want to buy him something to say thank you for Athene.

Please don't be offended, but I have another thing I really want to ask you. I just got up to Chapter 33 of Modern Magical History and there is a large write up on 'You-Know-Who'. You called him Voldemort and you were right, they don't even write down his name anywhere - that seems so weird. I mean in normal History books they still write down Hitler when they mention him. So in the chapter that discussed your role in what happened it doesn't sound like you at all. I checked up on the author and she's supposed to be very well respected but I just don't know now. If you don't want to answer I'll understand, but I'm just so confused. This book is supposed to be non-fiction. I remember you saying something about asking you rather than just thinking I knew, so please let me know what you think about it.

Did you know that Albus Dumbledore was also in Gryffindor? I just read that (I hope it's true). If so, it really is the House of those that do things! I want to be in that House more than ever now. Do you think it's worth starting a campaign to promote authors fact checking their work now, or should I wait till after I start school?

Anyhow, my alarm clock is ringing, which means it's time to practice my meditation again. It says to rest at least four hours between doing the exercises so I've been timing my breaks.

Your friend,  
Hermione Granger

* * *

Even Tom had been rather impressed by her perceptiveness. Though not all his observations were so positive.

'_Let's play spot the bookworm. Chapter 33 of Modern Magical History? I don't recall that being one of the course books.'_

"_Hey, be nice. We also bought that book!"_

'_Indeed but I haven't seen you reading it cover to cover.'_

"_She's just trying to catch up."_

'_Relax, Harry. I'm only making an observation, I'm not trying to put your girlfriend down.'_

"_She's not my... damn you, Tom. Stop trying to distract me. Let me find that chapter."_

'_I'm guessing you aren't going to like it.'_

Tom was right. Harry certainly wasn't happy and both of them wondered just what kind of reception he was going to get when September 1st arrived.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Towards the end of August, Harry and Hermione managed to arrange a picnic for themselves and Hermione's parents. The hardest part was convincing her parents that he would be fine travelling alone on the train to meet up with them. He finally had to convince Petunia to call them up and assure them that she was fine with it, that Harry often travelled by himself and was perfectly capable of looking after himself. Harry made an especially impressive and tasty dinner that night to thank her - he didn't mention the use of a little bit of magic to give the food that extra special kick.

Harry was already waiting at the station when the Grangers pulled up. Hermione hopped out of the car and waved Harry over, whilst her father kept the car idling.

"Hello, Harry. Come on, we are not meant to be parking here."

"Hi Hermione, Dr Granger and Mrs Granger." Harry thought it a little strange calling only Hermione's father Doctor, but Hermione had explained it had something to do with his education. Her father had already had a few issues with getting proper respect for his profession and had been less than impressed with Professor McGonagall who had nodded politely at the explanation given to her by Hermione and then immediately ignored it. It seemed she, like most wizards, cared little for getting muggle titles correct.

Dr Granger quirked a quick smile, "Good morning, Harry. You are not in my surgery, so please just call me Dan."

"And just Emma for me. Was the train ride okay?"

"Yes, it was fine. It's much less crowded on the weekends, thankfully, so no one stood on my foot." Harry had actually only caught the train a few times and he had only travelled during the day, but he wanted to give the impression that Petunia hadn't lied for him. Tom had assured him that his wandless curses were easily strong enough to protect himself from any muggle problems.

"Good, good. Well it's only a short way to the park so buckle up and we will be on our way."

As they started moving, Hermione started relating in rapid fire sentences her activities of the last week and her observations on the various books she had read. Harry was pleased to find himself occasionally being asked his opinion on many of the things she had read and, with Tom's help on the answers, thought he managed to come out sounding like he actually wasn't a total dunderhead.

'_If I had ears they would be ringing by now. Not sure how you are coping.'_

"_Shush you. She's just excited to have someone to chat with."_

'_Someone? I get the feeling she thinks of you as more than just someone.'_

"_Shush..."_

Tom cut him off _'Did she just say Malfoy?' _

"I'm sorry Hermione, who did you just mention, Malfoy?"

"Mr Lucius Malfoy. He's one of the school governors. I was saying that he led the vote to reduce the Hogwarts library budget. Can you believe that? Why would someone do that? Education is important and books are essential to that."

'_How is he not in Azkaban?'_

"_What do you mean?"_

'_Well.. actually maybe you should pay attention to your friend. We will discuss it later. I'm sorry for distracting you.'_

Harry tried to get back into the conversation, "Umm... yeah. Maybe he didn't think they had enough money?"

Hermione shrugged, unconvinced, "Then the ministry should be subsidising them. Cuts to education end up costing so much more in the long run. Everyone should know that. Well... at least those in education and government. I wonder if they have petitions in the magical world. Do you know, Harry?"

By the time they got to the park, Harry was feeling exhausted and was very happy when Hermione went along with his suggestion to go feed the ducks and to remain quiet whilst they did so, so as not to startle them. Hermione was nice and very intelligent, but though he hated to admit Tom was right about it, did go on a bit. He was expecting a snide comment from Tom after that quick thought, but Tom seemed preoccupied with his own thoughts. Harry wondered a bit about that. Tom could hear most of Harry's thoughts but Harry could only hear what Tom 'said'. He made a mental note to ask Tom about that later.

After feeding the ducks, the two of them went walking along the cobbled path that led around the small lake. Whilst climbing up some large rocks to check out the view, Harry reached out a hand and helped Hermione up. They remained holding hands for a few more minutes until Emma called them back for lunch. After racing back, they sat next to each other as they ate their sandwiches. Harry never noticed that Hermione's eyes were occasionally flicking between her hands and Harry's. He did however notice she was a little quieter after lunch as they lay in the sun and browsed through a book on birds together.

"Hey, this is Athene. Do you know about anything about our owls, Harry? They must be magical as they knew where to fly without ever being there. Can all owls do that?"

Harry smiled, "I guess it's just like wizards and muggles. Some Owls already have the ability and they are trained. Though from what I understand it's pretty simple and quick training. I'm not sure but Hedwig seems extra smart. I'm positive she understands so much more than just who to take a letter to.

Hermione laughed lightly, "I agree. I saw Hedwig trying to teach Athene how to undo the latches on her cage the other day. When she saw me watching her I could swear she looked a little guilty. I'm not sure if she tried again later but if so it didn't work. Athene is lovely but she's nowhere near as smart as Hedwig."

Harry smiled, "I bet if you said that near Hedwig she would puff up proudly before pecking you for speaking poorly of her friend."

"I wouldn't bet against you on that. Humm, do you think she could be a familiar?"

Harry considered that for a moment, "I'm not sure. Maybe she's just naturally very smart. I should ask her."

Both children laughed and agreed that'd be probably the easiest way to find out.

Harry and Hermione spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the park, with Harry spending the greater part of that time giving Hermione lessons in latin. She had been surprised and impressed when he explained the meanings of the scientific names on the little signs scattered amongst the plants. Harry decided she made a very good student and she promised to order a few books on latin so she could continue to study.

Whilst she knew no greek, it turned out her french was much better than Harry's and on the way to the restaurant for dinner they tried chatting in french. They might not have had much of a conversation, but they had a lot of fun and both were in a very good mood when Hermione grabbed Harry's hand and dragged him into the italian restaurant. She had tried to convince her parents to take them to a french restaurant but the booking had already been made, so they promised to take them another time.

Hermione's parents continued their own conversation as Harry and Hermione chatted about anything and everything they could think of. Harry had had friends for a few years now, but his conversations with them were alway a little stilted because he had to be careful about exactly what he said. With Hermione he could chat about nearly anything and not worry; Tom's presence being the one truly forbidden subject.

It wasn't till the end of meal that he became concerned when he realised he hadn't heard Tom's voice all afternoon.

"_Tom, are you there? Is everything okay?"_

'_Yes Harry. I am still here. I have just been thinking about Malfoy and what that might mean. I think we need to do some more research.'_

"_More reading?"_

'_I'm afraid so. But I have a feeling it may be important.'_

"_Okay."_

'_Thank you, Harry. I hope you have had an enjoyable day. Hermione is returning to the table, I will leave you be to enjoy your time with her.'_

"_Eh.. thanks."_

Dessert was also very enjoyable, especially for Harry, who hadn't experienced anything similar before. He decided he needed to pick up some dessert cookbooks.

As dinner went later than expected, Daniel Granger insisted on driving Harry home, even though it was around forty minutes out of their way. Harry's objections were ignored and Hermione decided they were going to continue to practice French on the way there. However, ten minutes later both of them were asleep in the back seat.

A rather disheveled Harry waved goodbye at number four.

"Thank you so much, this was the best day ever."

"Take care, Harry, hope we can do it again before school starts."

When he made it to his bed he mumbled, "So what was that about Malfoy?"

'_Lucius Malfoy was one of Voldemort's Inner Circle Death Eaters and an up-and-coming political figure. I am very surprised that he is not rotting in Azkaban. To me, it indicates that either the Death Eaters are now in power, there is another dark lord active or that the current government is corrupt. There is no way that a single dose of Veritaserum wouldn't have had all the Inner Circle members given life sentences.'_

Harry yawned and switched to thinking his words, _"Ohh.. so that's real bad, isn't it?"_

'_It's looking that way. I was thinking that it was likely the ministry's red tape that caused you to end up here, but if there are Death Eaters holding political power, that now seems less likely. Unless I've sorely misjudged Dumbledore, it's unlikely he would subject you to such living conditions. But that leaves me no idea who is responsible and I don't like that. I suggest we continue as we are and just keep a watchful eye out to learn what is really going on.'_

"_More reading and then wait and see?"_

'_I'm afraid so.'_


	5. Chapter 5 - The Hogwarts Express

_**Author Notes: **Thanks to all the readers and reviewers. Answers/replies to questions and comments are/will be posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/_

_****__**Update 14 July**: __Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter._

* * *

_**Chapter 5 - The Hogwarts Express**_

* * *

Once again Harry was keen for the summer to end so he could see Hermione. Unfortunately the Grangers' already busy work schedule had filled up with more conferences and meetings, and Harry and Hermione had been told they would be unable to organise another outing together. The two had to be content with sending letters and chatting occasionally on the phone.

When September the 1st finally came around, Harry was so keen to get there that the train trip to King's Cross seemed to drag on forever. His distraction led to him swapping to the wrong train during one line change. Tom had just laughed when Harry had asked him why he hadn't warned him and had replied that catching trains had never been his preferred method of transport.

When he got to platform nine at King's Cross and saw other people pushing trolleys with large trunks, boxes and bags stacked up, he was ever so glad that he had invested in the shrinking trunk tucked away in his pocket. His eyes opened in surprise when he saw one family pushing a trolley with an caged owl on top; he wondered why they hadn't sent their owl on ahead. They didn't look like muggles to him.

He waited until a bench became available and then sat down to crowd watch. He would have preferred to read a book but, surrounded by muggles, he didn't think it would be appropriate to pull out one of his textbooks. Luckily, he didn't have long to wait till Hermione and her parents arrived.

Greetings were quickly exchanged.

"Hello, Harry."

"Hi Hermione, Dan, Emma. Hope you enjoyed the rest of your summer."

"Thanks, Harry. We did, I am sorry we couldn't arrange another time to take you out for a picnic."

"It's okay, Emma. It gave me plenty of time to study."

"Indeed. It was difficult to get our Hermione here to leave her bedroom. She wanted to spend all her time reading or writing letters to you."

"Dad!" Both Hermione and Harry blushed at her father's words.

"You both look after yourselves, okay? Hermione, please make sure to leave yourself some time to relax, sleep and eat properly. Harry, you too, and please look after our daughter."

"Yes, sir."

Emma Granger and Dan both gave Hermione a cuddle before stepping back.

Hermione chewed her lips as she eyed the barrier that she knew separated them from the magical world and the train that would take them to Hogwarts. With a small smile and wave at her parents, Harry led Hermione through the barrier.

Two jaws dropped as they stared out at a sea of wizards and witches, many of them in brightly coloured robes. Scattered amongst them, were children of many ages chatting and laughing and towering over them all was a massive bright red Hogwarts Express steam train.

The two of them walked slowly forward, dodging and ducking members of the seething crowd as they pushed the trolley with Hermione's trunk towards the train. They had seen plenty of wizards and witches at Diagon Alley, but it had been nowhere near as busy or as exciting as here.

'_Harry, the serious looking woman with the monocle is the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. One of those two girls with her must be her niece. Go introduce yourself and ask if they are first years as well. She would be a very useful ally.'_

Harry gave a mental sigh but, grabbing Hermione's hand, pushed the trolley with the other, "Come on Hermione, let's go make some friends."

Dragging a rather surprised Hermione, Harry approached the two girls and smiled. "Hello, are you first years as well?"

The taller of the two girls nervously played with one of her long blonde pigtails and muttered, "Ah, yes, hello."

The other girl giggled at her companion before giving Harry and Hermione a bright smile and straightening her back. "Hello. My name is Susan Bones, this is my friend Hannah Abbott and this is my Aunt Madam Bones. Pleased to meet you."

Harry also stood up a little taller before bobbing his head to the lady and giving the two girls a cheeky grin "Madam Bones, Miss Bones, Miss Abbott. Pleased to meet you too. This is my dear friend Hermione Granger and my name is Harry Potter, but please just call me Harry."

Both girls gave little gasps and their eyes shot straight to Harry's scar. Harry had long ago changed his hairstyle so that the scar, whilst not emphasized, was not hidden either.

Madam Bones raised one eyebrow slightly before mildly scolding the two girls, "Girls, enough of that." She nodded to Harry. "Indeed, it is a pleasure to meet you, Mr Potter... Harry. Though I would prefer to dawdle, the world waits for no witch. I wish you all the best for your school year. Susan I trust you will see everyone on to the train with no delay?"

The short redhead nodded. "Yes, Aunty."

A round of thank yous and goodbyes ensued before Susan, proudly but with a cheeky wink at Hermione, led the four onto the train. "Let's find an empty compartment so we can sit near the windows."

It was still early, so they easily found a suitable compartment and Harry lifted up the girls trunks and put them up on the luggage rail.

Susan asked the obvious question, "Harry, where is your trunk?"

Harry took out his shrunken trunk and enlarged it with a tap of his wand, putting it with the others. "I bought one that has built in shrinking charms as I had to make my own way to the station and dragging a big trunk the whole way would have been hard."

"You took the Floo?"

Harry shook his head, "I was raised by muggles. I took three trains to get here."

Both girls were rather shocked and Hannah spoke up for the first tone since her shy hello. "You were raised by muggles? But I thought you had been receiving special training and traveling the world?"

Hermione shook her head, "You read the same books that I did. They are all lies. I think Harry should sue the publishers."

Susan asked "Who is Sue?"

Hermione's explanation and Susan's translation into Wizarding terms took them up to departure time.

Just as the train started to move, a chubby short blonde boy peered in and stuttered something. He looked like he was about to move on when Susan lept up and dragged him into the compartment. "Hi, Neville! Come join us. You already know Hannah, but this is Hermione Granger and Harry Potter, but all the stories in the books are lies. Harry, Hermione, this is Neville Longbottom. Our families are friends."

_'So that is Neville Longbottom. He also fit the prophecy, but Voldemort considered the Potters as more of a threat, so presumed it was you that could vanquish him. Guess he choose correctly since the chubby boy sure doesn't look like dark lord defeating material.'_

_"Hey, let him be. He's only a eleven and hasn't had a crazy old voice in the head teaching him since he was two."_

_'So that is how you repay my tireless efforts to train you? By insulting me?' _Tom's voice was obviously amused.

_"Shush you. I want to listen to my new friends."_

Neville turned out to be as shy as he looked, but Susan and even Hannah were used to it and managed to pull him out of his shell enough that he eventually joined in their conversation.

They all talked about their families, though Harry was asked the most questions and Neville only talked about his grandmother, uncle and aunties.

Susan asked the most questions about muggles, while Hermione asked the most about wizards and witches. Harry had to remind Hermione a few times to calm down when she got over-excited. Mostly, however, only a little nudge was needed. A reassuring smile from him and the others made sure she didn't get embarrassed.

Tom remained mostly quiet, though he did occasionally prod Harry to ask a little more detail about certain cases and individuals Susan mentioned when she was talking about her Aunt's work.

A few of Susan and Hannah's friends came by and introductions were made. They all stared at Harry's scar and were told that all the stories were lies. Soon, all the kids were taking turns doing the introductions and explaining about the lies to the newcomers, even Neville.

The news was obviously passed beyond just their friends, as eventually an arrogant blond boy with two brutish sidekicks came by.

He looked around the room with a sneer plastered across his face finally settling on Harry, "So you're Harry Potter." He puffed up his chest. "I'm Malfoy, Draco Malfoy. Pleased to meet you." He stuck out his hand without moving forward so that Harry would have to stand to shake it.

_"Tom, what do I do?"_

_'Greet him and stick out your hand, but don't get up. We don't know the whole situation yet so don't burn any bridges, but you shouldn't show weakness either.'_

Harry did as advised and stuck out his hand without standing so there remained a two foot gap between the two hands. "Pleased to meet you as wel,l Malfoy. I heard that your father is one of the school governors. Is that right?"

Draco fought the impulse to make a rude comment for a moment, before he stepped forward and shook Harry's hand. He took a deep slow controlled breath before replying, "You heard right. You can always find a Malfoy in a position of power. I'll be seeing you around Potter."

"Harry is fine and I look forward to it."

"Right then... Later, Harry. " Draco did his best to slowly and calmly exit the compartment, pausing just at the exit to add "You can call me Draco." Then he was gone.

Susan gave Harry a little applause. "We'll handled, Harry. I'm impressed, that didn't go at all like he expected."

Hermione looked rather perplexed, "Can someone please explain to me what just happened? Why were you both so formal, Harry?"

And so the rest of the journey was spent educating Hermione on some of the nuances of pure blood politics and power plays. Neville turned out to be a font of information on customs and proper behaviours, though he often had to be prompted by Susan or Hannah. Harry picked up a lot of useful information and he hoped that he might be able to hold his own someday without always relying on Tom's help.

When the announcement came that they were five minutes away, Neville and Harry replaced their jackets with robes, exited the compartment and guarded it whilst the girls changed. Eventually, as the train was beginning to slow, the girls tapped on the door to let them know they had finally finished changing. Both boys wondered why it took so long to just throw a robe over their other clothing, but they didn't question it nor did they hear anything of what was said in the compartment when they were outside of it.

Hermione and Harry got to say hello to Hagrid as he led them toward the boats. Hermione still hadn't discovered Hagrid's birthday, but there was no opportunity to ask at the time.

Following the path towards the lake, they came around a bend and were able to see Hogwarts for the first time. There was a long pause as everyone stood astounded at the splendor of the lit castle glistening on the other side of the dark lake.

"Wow."

'_It's a powerful place, Harry. Strong magic in those walls and in the surrounding lands. Spending time here will help your magic develop.'_

"_It's beautiful."_

After the mad scramble to find a boat, Harry and Hermione found themselves in a boat with Neville and a redheaded boy who introduced himself as Ron Weasley. Harry had to roll his eyes when Ron starting asking questions about how much he remembered of the night Lord Voldemort was defeated. Everyone else he had met had at least tried to pretend to not be so interested. Both he and Neville jumped to Hermione's defence after she reported that all the books were lies and Ron retorted with a fairly rude comment about how could she possibly know. The tiff didn't come to blows, but it did put a damper on the second half of the boat ride.

It was soon forgotten as they ducked under a thick curtain of ivy. Harry, wondering how Hagrid could possibly get under it, turned and watched as Hagrid just pushed the heave vines aside and went through the gap, letting it close behind him.

The lanterns floating alongside the boats spread out to light up a large cavern and a stone dock. Soon, they were getting out of the boats and climbing up the steep stairs towards a massive door that seemed to lean out over them.

Harry handed Neville back his squirming toad that he had taken from the nervous boy before they had climbed into the boats.

"Use two hands, Neville, and just let the legs hang free. That way, he can't kick off. Later, ask one of the House Elves to put together a glass box that he can live in."

"House Elves?"

"I'll tell you about them later, Hermione."

'_I have a feeling that may be a long conversation.'_


	6. Chapter 6 - The Sorting

_**Author Notes: **Thanks to all my readers and reviewers. I am rather surprised that this story has generated as much interest as it has. I don't pretend to be a great writer, English was always my worst subject though I'd like to think I have a buff creativity muscle. What I write here is primarily aimed at entertaining myself and I am rather chuffed that it is able to also provide some measure of entertainment to others. The interest shown in my story has certainly prompted me to pay a bit more attention to my proofreading, hopefully that shows up in more polished chapters and less need to repost each chapter multiple times (I'm an optimist). Note this has been a quick update but I am not expecting the next to be quite as fast being that I'm not quite sure where Chapter 9 is taking me._

_As always answers and replies to questions and comments are or will be posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/ _

_****__**Update 14 July**: __Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter._

* * *

_**Chapter 6 - The Sorting**_

* * *

The entrance hall was full of extremely nervous looking first years waiting for Professor McGonagall to return. It was only fractionally warmer here than out of the lake, so the students were still all wrapped up tight in their thick robes. Summer already seemed like a long time ago.

Over by his goons, a perplexed Draco Malfoy keep glancing across the crowd at Harry. A little further away, Ron was nervously shifting on his feet, mumbling something and fiddling with his wand. Occasionally tiny orange sparks would fly from the end.

Hermione stood next to Harry and was busy interrogating Neville on his life, in an effort to find some worthy examples to show him, that he had nothing to worry about. It was hard to get Neville to speak positively about himself, but Hermione's perseverance was beginning to show results. It seemed Neville wasn't scared of some rather nasty plants.

Also nearby, Susan and Hannah were busy reassuring each other that if they ended up in Gryffindor and Slytherin they would still remain the best of friends no matter if they had to fight every other member of their new houses to do so.

Harry listened to his friends for a moment before deciding to go introduce himself to a few of the other students. He picked those that weren't so involved in their own preparations. Most seemed happy for the distraction and those that weren't that friendly were at least polite.

He continued chatting with people until a shriek from one of the girls had everyone turn and gasp in surprise. A strange assortment of ghosts had just floated through a wall seemingly deep in conversation with each other.

'_Ah, the ghosts coming in to scare the first years again. I am sure one of the staff must put them up to it. Ghosts are notoriously bad at remembering any dates apart from their death days. Most couldn't even tell you what year or day of the week it is even if you had told them the day before.'_

"_Can they hurt us?"_

'_Generally, no. There are a few spells that can grant them certain powers for a short time and some spirits that can interact with the physical world, but there is nothing to fear from any of these particular ghosts. The poltergeist named Peeves is a different story. He likes to play pranks and he's hurt many a student over the year.'_

"_Can't they get rid of him?"_

'_I'm not sure. I would have thought so but maybe his essence is tied to Hogwarts in some manner.'_

Harry listened to the ghosts pass on their best wishes before Professor McGonagall returned to lead them into the Great Hall. As they passed through the massive doors Harry's jaw dropped.

"Wow."

'_That's getting repetitive.'_

"_Shush you. Just because you've seen it before. It's amazing."_

'_It's very impressive charms work, if that is what you mean.'_

"_No, I mean it's beautiful. Like a romantic dinner for a hundred people on a dark lake."_

'_If you say so.' _ Tom's voice was dismissive.

Harry finally took his eyes off the room and looked at the small stool placed just beside where Professor McGonagall had come to a halt.

"_That is the sorting hat? Not very impressive."_

'_Indeed, though it's one of the more powerful magical artifacts within the castle. What the founders were thinking of when they chose to enchant that ratty old thing with so much power I have no idea.'_

Both Harry and Tom went quiet as they listened to the song sang by the Hat.

'_Different words but pretty much the same old song from when I was here.'_

Without delay, Professor McGonagall started the sorting and Harry clapped along with everyone else as first Hannah and then Susan went to join the Hufflepuff table, both obviously relieved to be together.

'_And so the two loyal friends join the House of the loyal.'_

As names continued to be called out, Harry glanced over at the teachers sitting at the head table. Not all their faces were visible from where he stood but, as they moved about, one face came into view from behind Hagrid.

'_SNAPE? What the hell is he doing here?' _Tom's sudden exclamation caused Harry to twitch.

"_Ahh.. what? Who is Snape?" _ He smiled and gave a little shake of his head to Hermione, who was giving him a concerned look.

'_Damn. Sorry, Harry. I need to think about this and you need to pay attention to what is going on without me distracting you. I'll go hide deep in the quiet. Best of luck Harry. Remember, no matter what house you end up in we can make it work for us, don't worry about it.'_

"_Okay, then... thanks Tom."_

Harry felt Tom's presence fade away. It was strange, but it was not a surprise as they had practiced this a number of times in preparation for this moment.

"Granger, Hermione!"

Harry gave Hermione an encouraging smile, "Go get em, Hermione!"

Hermione returned his smile and straightening her back strode forward confidently and her head disappeared under the hat. A few seconds passed and then 'GRYFFINDOR!"

Harry clapped loudest.

It was a long wait till Harry's turn. He watched as Neville joined Hermione at Gryffindor's table and Draco went to Slytherin.

When his name was called, excited whispers broke out amongst all the students and even those few that hadn't been paying much attention to the sorting twisted their heads to look.

As the oversized hat fell over his eyes, almost knocking his glasses off, he wondered why they hadn't chosen a more suitably sized hat to sort children.

A faint voice came from right next to his ear, "Already with the questions, eh? Intelligence and curiosity are some of Ravenclaw's favoured traits. Well, let me sate that curiosity. Sorting is just one of my many responsibilities, young boy. I see that you are not at all scared to be here, impressively Gryffindor, that is. Humm, a little doubt over here and something you don't want me to know. Not to worry, your secrets are safe with me especially since you are doing such a fine job of concealing them. Slytherin would impressed. I see that you are a hard worker but too focused on the goal to be true Badger material. Hufflepuff would still have been happy to have you, but I think elsewhere for you.."

Harry whispered in a voice he hoped would be heard only by the hat, "My friend went to Gryffindor. I think I would be a good fit there..."

"Ahh so you would tell me my job, eh? You have some nerve. So, who am I to disagree when my master would be so proud. GRYFFINDOR!"

The hall broke out in a torrent of clapping and shouting. Once again he found himself absentmindedly shaking hands as he made his way to sit between Hermione and Neville, who had saved him a spot. Two older redhead twins who reminded him of Ron Weasley clapped and chanted, "We got Potter! We got Potter!"

He rolled his eyes at them and they winked and returned cheeky grins.

As the rest of the first years were sorted, Harry congratulated both Hermione and Neville before turning his attention back to the staff at the head table. He looked at the greasy haired man that Tom had called Snape. An unpleasant and unhappy looking man with a hook nose and sallow skin. The man noticed his gaze and turned his cold gaze on Harry and his sneer became more pronounced. Harry affected an expression of puzzlement and turned away.

One of the twins leaned across the table towards him, "Impressive. Snape normally waits till his first class before demonstrating his hatred for all Gryffindors. Seems he's got a headstart with you. Fred Weasley by the way and there here is George." Both brothers shook Harry's hand.

At Harry's questioning glance back at the staff table George added, "He's the Potions Professor, Head of Slytherin, Wannabee Defence of the Dark Arts teacher and an all round unpleasant fellow. To not get on his bad side you can either.."

Fred interjected, "..be in Slytherin or .."

George finished the sentence, "..not attend Hogwarts. Oh look we got little Ronniekins. Welcome to the Lions, Ron!"

Another boy who had introduced himself as Percy Weasley when he had shaken Harry's hand stood up and, in a pompous voice, said, "Well done, Ron, quite excellent."

The two twins rolled their eyes before turning their attention to the head table where the Headmaster had just stood up smiling broadly to welcome everyone and finish off with some nonsensical words.

Harry exchanged confused looks with Hermione and Neville before asking the twins, "What's nitwit, blubber, oddment and tweak?"

Fred just laughed, "Some people think we are a bit.."

"..crazy but we don't hold a candle up to the madness of.."

"..the great Albus Dumbledore."

Harry laughed with the others and then looked down as the table suddenly groaned under the weight of a massive banquet. He and the others wasted no time in getting started gorging themselves on the steaming food. It had been a long train ride with only a few snacks to keep them going, so there was little talk as the students started working their way through the spread.

Harry decided that whilst the variety was great, the dishes could do with a bit more flavour. He had long ago taken it upon himself to make the bland dishes his Aunt had taught him more interesting, so he had invested in a number of cookbooks and taught himself many new recipes. His collection of books had grown over the years and he had come to really enjoy his time cooking and experimenting with his recipes. He wondered if the elves would be okay with him occasionally cooking himself a meal.

After the initial rush to fill stomachs abated, many at the table interspaced bites of food with conversation. Harry answered a few questions asked of him and added a few brief responses when the round-the-table questions got to him. Questions such as first accidental magic, favourite quidditch team and preferred model of broom. Even though everyone was friendly enough and he was sitting next to Hermione, he started feeling a little lonely. He was too used to the occasional snide observation or chat with Tom and he still hadn't returned. He wished he could call him back but he knew from testing that until Tom judged enough time must have passed, neither of them were going to be able to hear each other.

Soon, the desserts were finished and the dishes all disappeared as suddenly as they had appeared. Dumbledore gave some warnings about the nearby Forbidden Forest, informed everyone on the restriction on casting magic in the corridors between classes, mentioned Quidditch trials and gave a very strange warning about a very painful death waiting in the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side that got many people whispering. Finally he ended with the very badly sang school song. Harry tried to pay attention to it all.

Percy, who turned out to be one of the Gryffindor prefects, led Harry and the other first years on a crazy journey along corridors, through doors, many hidden, and up staircases to the Gryffindor Tower. Harry, tired like the rest but also now feeling Tom's missing presence more keenly, tailed the group and barely paid noticed when they encountered Peeves the Poltergeist. He didn't even notice Percy opening the door to the tower. When the group came to a halt he woke up enough to glance around the common room and idly note that it looked rather comfortable, before letting himself be led to the first years boys dorm.

Soon he was staring at the roof listening to the snores of the other boys. He was tired, but sleep didn't seem to be a possibility. He wanted to hear from Tom. It had been too long, when Tom had practiced retreating deep into what Tom called the quiet, he had never been away so long.

After an hour of laying on the bed, a very worried Harry finally sat up in bed and poured himself a glass of water. He rubbed his tired eyes and started calling out to Tom in his mind. He knew from their testing that they had never had any success hearing each other when Tom was in the quiet, but couldn't think of anything else to do.

"_Tom. Can you hear me?"_

"_Tom. Where are you?"_

"_Why won't you answer me, Tom?"_

"_Please Tom, come back to me."_

'_Harry...' _Tom's voice was so faint that Harry wondered he was imagining it.

"_Tom. Is that you? I can barely hear you." _

'_Harry.. keep talking, please.' _The voice seemed a little stronger.

"_Tom. I'm here. What's wrong? Why are you so quiet? What do you want me to talk about?" _

'_Thank you, Harry. I've found you now. Something happened and I got... lost. It wasn't till I heard your voice that I could find my way back.'_ Tom's voice was much stronger now.

"_I don't understand." _ Harry was confused but he felt his worry draining away.

'_I'm not sure I do either, Harry. I was in the quiet, hopeful that the sorting should have been well over and about to return when a darkness washed over me. I say darkness but it' wasn't a literal darkness, being that there is no sight where I am except when you choose to share what you see. All my senses went crazy, I felt hot and cold, like I was moving fast and falling, swimming and spinning. Then it was gone and I was lost in the quiet.' _

Harry was surprised a bit about Tom's words. Tom was usually a lot more literal in his descriptions.

'_I wandered looking for my way out, but until you called had just found more quiet. Did anything strange happen during the sorting?'_

"_I don't think so. The hat could tell I was hiding something but seemed to only think that it meant I would make a good Slytherin, however it also thought I would make a good Gryffindor and Ravenclaw as well." _Harry's internal voice was full of pride.

'_Well, Harry are you going to tell me what House you got sorted into or do you want me to guess?'_

"_I should, but no. I asked for Gryffindor and it let me go there."_

'_So I'm guessing that rather than remembering the potential for which House would be most suitable you just followed Hermione?"_

"_Ehh.. yes."_ Harry blushed a little. _"But you did say that Gryffindor would also be really good for my image."_

'_Indeed, Harry. Well done. So there were no unusual delays before or during the sorting?'_

Harry thought back for a moment, _"No. A few people took a few minutes and I guess I might have been a little longer but that was it." _

'_Then it is unlikely whatever happened to me occurred during the sorting. What about afterwards, during the banquet?'_

"_People chatted and then we had a big meal. I caught the eye of Professor Snape for just a moment, but I was a long way away and didn't feel anything. After dinner, Dumbledore mentioned something strange about the third-floor corridor and dying a painful death to anyone who went there. I didn't catch his eye at all. We met Peeves on the way back to the tower but I was at the back of the group and didn't get involved. Then we were back here and everyone else went to sleep."_

Tom considered for a moment,_ 'I doubt it was anything to do with Legilimency. Your shields and defences are good enough that, even close up, Snape couldn't have gone in undetected. He was a very strong Occlumens but only a half decent Legilimens and I doubt even I could have penetrated your mind undetected with your current skill.' _Tom paused for a moment, _'Why didn't you go to sleep with everyone else? You seem very tired.'_

"_I was worried about you. I didn't like it when I couldn't hear you."_

'_Thank you, Harry, though I think we need to discuss this more later. I can't remain with you forever.' _This was a little sense of concern in Tom's tone.

"_I know, but if you need to go, I'd at least like to say goodbye."_

'_That's very kind of you, Harry. You should sleep now. Goodnight, Harry.'_

"_Okay. Goodnight, Tom."_

* * *

_**More Author Notes: Not too sure if the specifics are of much interest to anyone but the class lists I'm working with are as follows. I consider it my tweaked canon list.**_

_**Gryffindorstudents-**__ Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Neville Longbottom, Ronald Weasley, Dean Thomas, Seamus Finnigan, Parvati Patil, and Lavender Brown (8 total)_

_**Hufflepuffstudents**__ - Susan Bones, Hannah Abbott, Justin Finch-Fletchley, Ernie Macmillan, Wayne Hopkins, Zacharias Smith, Leanne Kettle, Megan Jones, Sally-Anne Perks and Lily Moon (10 total)_

_**Ravenclawstudents**__ - Padma Patil, Lisa Turpin, Terry Boot, Su Li , Michael Corner, Kevin Entwhistle, Stephen Cornfoot, Anthony Goldstein, Morag MacDougal, and Mandy Brocklehurst (10 total)_

_**Slytherinstudents**__ - Draco Malfoy, Millicent Bulstrode, Vincent Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, Pansy Parkinson, Theodore Nott, Blaise Zabini, Daphne Greengrass, and Tracey Davis (9 total)_

_**P.S. Apologies to everyone that wanted a non Gryffindor Harry, I still think his personal traits still match that house best. Tom is not the one being sorted. Strangely enough the five story ideas I'm currently working on (two published) all have Harry in Gryffindor. I guess for the time being at least I'm stuck on that one particular piece of canon.**_

_****____Update 27 September: _Terry Boot's named fixed. He is not a toad! Thanks AllieOfGreenGables


	7. Chapter 7 - Classes

_**Author Notes: **Thanks to all the readers and reviewers. Answers/replies to questions and comments are/will be posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/_

_****__**Update 14 July**: __Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter._

* * *

_**Chapter 7 - Classes**_

* * *

Charms soon became Harry's favourite class. The diminutive Professor Flitwick usually started his lessons with a magical display followed by theory and ending with a practical section. Tom had already tutored him on a large number of useful charms, so Harry had been concerned he'd be bored. He soon found his fears unfounded. The charms Flitwick started with, mostly colour and texture changing ones, were nothing like those that Tom had taught him. Also, Tom's theoretical knowledge only included what he had read over the summer and Professor Flitwick's explanations and examples made it so much more understandable and useful.

Having just finished helping Hermione tweak one of the wand movements, he asked Tom about that. _"Tom, why didn't you start off teaching me all this?"_

'_All what, Harry? I taught you all the basic and more advanced wand movements and how to correctly pronounce Latin and Greek.'_

"_I mean, all this theory about magic and how it affects different substances, all the conditions and stuff and you never taught me any colour changing charms."_

'_Do you really want to learn all the theory and spells twice, Harry? I understand the need to practice, but there is no need to waste your time practicing and relearning utility spells. Most of the spells I taught have useful functions or are unlikely to be in the syllabus. There are a few reasons for that. It'll be to your advantage if you can cast spells people don't expect you to know, especially if you can cast them well. Learning first year charms before you attend school could also lead to trouble, can you work out why?'_

Harry considered Tom's question as he practiced the incantation_, "Because if I had already learned all this, then it would be obvious that I had help?"_

'_Very good, Harry. Look at Hermione. She has the movement and incantation correct but she needs to be reminded to focus her mind. She is concerning herself too much with the movement and words and not the desired effect. Tell her, Harry.'_

Hermione frowned when Harry made the suggestion. She moved her finger to point at a paragraph in _'The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 1' _and she opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. A smile lit Harry's face as a thoughtful look crossed her face and, ignoring the book, she tried the spell again. The piece of parchment she had been working on instantly turned a brilliant yellow.

"Thank you, Harry. I wish they had said that in the book. I wonder just how much research they put into the book. Did you notice none of them have a bibliography, glossary or index?"

Professor Flitwick wandered over and clapped happily, "Well done indeed, Mr Potter and Miss Granger. One point each. Now please try for some other colours."

After both quickly achieved a few additional colours, they turned to help others with the spell and soon had earned their house two more points each for their actions.

By the following day, in Charms, Harry and Hermione had already read ahead and so spent most of the practical section assisting both their fellow Gryffindor classmates and also the Hufflepuff students who they shared Charms with. Professor Flitwick was very impressed and Gryffindor gained more points.

Susan and Hannah suggested, and Hermione and Harry quickly agreed to, a joint Gryffindor Hufflepuff Charms study session once a week. Soon, the group swelled in size with around half the Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors putting in their names to be part of the group.

After the first study session, the only member the two elected leaders, Harry and Hermione, had reservations about, was Ron Weasley. He didn't seem to take the work seriously, preferring to spend the study session attempting to engage Harry in conversation.

It all came to a head towards the end of their second study session.

Harry had been trying to explain why the third part of the wand movement affected the colouring changing charm to Hannah whilst Ron was once again trying to get his attention so he could teach him some more about the different Quidditch teams. "Ron, please stop with the Quidditch. We are studying Charms."

Ron snorted, "Charms, Charms. Come on, Harry, Quidditch is much more interesting."

Hermione huffed, "This is our Charms study session, you know, Ron. Really, you should be trying harder."

"What you saying? Just cause you already memorized all the books I have to work harder or something? I don't need to be a.."

Harry cut him off, "Ron, if you are rude to Hermione you can just leave. If you don't want to study, why are you here?"

Ron clenched his jaw and looked about ready to explode.

'_Hand him a branch, Harry, ask him to teach you about Quidditch later.'_

Harry almost frowned. He didn't really see the point, but followed the advice, "You know a lot about Quidditch, Ron, and it does sound interesting, fun even. How about after we finish here you teach me about it? Just not now, alright?"

The anger drained out of Ron and he grinned. "Yeah, it's right fun. Me and.. yeah, right. Okay, sorry, Harry... Hermione. I'll tell you all about it later. Charms first. Sorry."

Hermione narrowed her eyes as she stared at Ron for a moment before muttering, "Okay." then turned back to Justin Finch-Fletchley who she was coaching on wand movements.

Harry smiled and turned back to Hannah as Ron opened his textbook to the relevant chapter and listened in.

Gryffindor and Hufflepuff also had Herbology and Astronomy together. For their Herbology study group, the Charms group decided to stick together. Neville was elected as the study leader for those sessions. He had been rather reluctant to take the responsibility, again doubting his abilities, however the rest had unanimously agreed that he was easily the best choice given his natural talent with plants. Also, when discussing plants, his normal nervousness just dissipated so, as long as it was in Herbology he turned out to be a good study leader. Generally they met to study in the same empty classroom as they did for Charms but after a few weeks Neville managed to talk Professor Sprout into occasionally letting the study group into one of the greenhouses as long as she was working in there at the time. Everyone was very impressed, especially when Neville had made them all promise not to tell anyone else as it certainly wasn't normal for any of the younger years to have only partially supervised access to even the least dangerous of the greenhouses.

For Astronomy, they didn't bother forming a study group. It turned out easier to just study that in pairs or small groups. The classes were mildly interesting, though occasionally frustrating to Harry, as Tom didn't think highly of the subject and made many more disparaging and distracting remarks within that class. Still, Harry couldn't fault him too much; he was such a big help for the other subjects that having to put up with that behaviour for just one class was still a good deal.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Transfiguration was with the Ravenclaws, who tended for the most part to form study groups within their house only so, by the end of the first week, all the first year Gryffindors had done the same. Sadly, it was much less well organised than the Charms one and, since they hadn't organised any sort of official leader to the study group, they just had to put up with members of the group getting distracted fairly frequently. Deciding to hold it in the Gryffindor common room hadn't been the best idea either. Ron's effort to stay focused when Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnigan started talking sport impressed Harry and, when Ron finally took control and asked the two boys to join him away from the rest to continue the conversation, he almost cheered. Sadly, Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil continued to mix discussion on what Harry considered frivolous topics with their study and practice.

Harry and Hermione found their Occlumency exercises made Transfiguration much easier, so they introduced a number of the simpler exercises to their study group. To their surprise, Neville took to those exercises like a fish to water and, after only a few Transfiguration lessons, his practical work had improved by leaps and bounds. Tom often made comments about something strange about Neville's magic during Transfiguration but, whilst Harry thought it was curious, he didn't think too much about it.

No one could be bothered forming a study group for History of Magic, though all the Ravenclaws and Gryffindors were most impressed with Harry when he gathered everyone together after class during the second week and presented a compiled collection of Binn's notes that had been proven to be nearly unchanged for the past eight decades. He also had with him notes on a duplication charm specific to paper that could be used by first years. It took the better part of an hour for enough students to get the hang of the charm so that they could make duplications and hand them out to everyone. The charm initially lasted only a few days, so Harry made it a habit to bring his originals to every class just in case anyone needed to recast it. However, for most of the class he read his own history books, which he soon found himself sharing and trading with the rest of the class. By the end of the six weeks, Mandy Brocklehurst of Ravenclaw had created a system for tracking the various history books everyone was bringing, including who owned which, who had borrowed it, and for how long for.

The third subject Gryffindor had with the Ravenclaws was Defence Against the Dark Arts and, if anything, it was worse than History of Magic as even though it was just as useless information wise, you couldn't do self study during the class as easily. Professor Quirrell turned out to be rather a joke but, what was worse, Tom discovered that there was something in the classroom that adversely affected him so, for that particular class, Tom would move a little way into the quiet. Not so far that he couldn't communicate with Harry, but far enough that he lost contact with what Harry was sensing or doing.

No one formed a study group for DADA, as the homework was so easy that nobody had any problems with it.

After the second class, Tom explained why they had such a useless teacher to Harry,_ 'Many years ago, when Lord Voldemort returned to Britain after travelling on the continent in search of dark magic and a very specific artifact, he came here to Hogwarts. Dumbledore had since become Headmaster and he came in to apply, for the second time actually, for the post of Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts. He had two reasons to apply for the position. One was to get access to Hogwarts so he could hide one of his Horcruxes in the castle and the second was that, as a Professor at Hogwarts, he would have ready access to many potential new recruits. _

_However, Dumbledore refused him the post and, though he expected as much, he was still infuriated enough that he cast a powerful Curse on the castle. The Curse has ever since meant that no one has ever managed to hold the post for longer than a year. Though he may have cast it in spite, it has had a powerful effect that played to his strengths rather well. Ever since then, the quality of the education in that field has significantly dropped.'_

"_Can the Curse be removed?"_

'_Indeed, but unfortunately you as yet do not have the power to do it. Lord Voldemort had to pour in an immense amount of power to create the Curse and though you don't need quite as much, trying to dispel it now would leave you dangerously exhausted or even dead.'_

"_So, we have only have to put up for Quirrell for one year, then."_

'_See, a silver lining to the dark cloud. I wouldn't be surprised if the spell that affects me so within the classroom is a ward or something similar created by an earlier more capable professor. I think next weekend it would be worthwhile exploring the room a bit further before we assume that, though. Tonight let's revise your knowledge of detection spells.'_

"_Gah.. they are difficult."_

'_All the reason to practice them frequently.'_

_-my-friend-tom-_

The last two classes were with the Slytherins. It seemed to be well known that the Gryffindors and Slytherins had a long time feud, so they had most of their classes with the other houses. However, Potions turned out to be the absolutely worst choice to have with the snakes, as far as Harry was concerned.

Harry had entered the class looking forward to the subject, even though he had already been told a number of horror stories about Professor Snape by other students. Tom had told Harry very little about the man, saying that until he had more information it was all guesswork, but they would discuss it more after the first class. Harry loved cooking and imagined that brewing would be very similar. He had already studied a large number of potions,including not only those that Tom had asked him to learn but also the others in the books that they had been described in. He had read up on all the ingredients and interactions he needed for the potions in the textbook and on Tom's list and was keen to start experimenting.

The class took place in the chilly dungeons near where Harry had been told the Slytherin common room and dormitories were. His first indication that it wasn't going to be a pleasant lesson came about when Snape got to his name during the roll call. "Ah, yes, Harry Potter. Our new... celebrity."

The Slytherins all sniggered.

'_Sounds like you have a fan, Harry. Maybe you should offer him a signed copy of Harry Potter and the Greasy Potion Master.'_

Harry couldn't quite suppress a giggle as he called, "Here, Sir."

Snape glared at him as he continued with the roll call and gave an impassioned speech about potion making before ruining the tone by adding a childish insult to the end.

'_Well, he certainly hasn't changed his attitude much over the past ten years. Always thinking he was better than everyone else. Mind you, when it came to potions, that was true.'_

"_He's a good teacher?"_

'_No idea, I just know that he was one of the best if not the best potion brewer in the country at the time.'_

Snape glanced around the room before his eyes snapped back to Harry and he sneered, "Potter! What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

Harry thought for a second, "Well, I imagine it would be similar to the Draught of Living Death but without the Valerian root or the Sopophorous Bean it wouldn't be such a strong sedative. Maybe just paralysis. Is that what we are going to be experimenting with today, Sir?"

Snape sneer froze.

'_I do believe he was not expecting you to answer, Harry.'_

"_So why did he ask, then?"_

Snape frowned and asked his second question, "Where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"

Harry glanced around the room and spotted the potions supply cupboard, "I'd check the section listed as antidotes first and if not there I would check amongst the area labeled as non magical animal ingredients, Sir."

Snape snapped, "Explain!"

Harry took a deep breath, "A bezoar is a stone-like aggregation of matter taken from the stomach of a goat. Though it's actually made up of plant fibre it had been common practice to group it with animal products. Its main use is as an antidote hence why it is commonly included in medical kits and with other antidotes."

Snape snorted, "Right then, someone else. Who knows the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

Hermione put up her hand and Snape, after glaring at the Slytherins - none of whom raised their hand - finally turned his attention to her, "Wel,l then?"

"It's the same plant, Sir. Also known as Aconite."

Snape sneer returned, "And that it's the limit of your knowledge, then?"

"No Sir, I also know its leaves are very poisonous and the fleshy roots and purple flowers are common potion ingredients. There are over a hundred different species. It's a perennial plant and..."

'_Still a bookworm though at least she knew the answer.'_

"Fine, fine. Well why aren't you all taking notes? It seems that most of this class are exactly the dunderheads that I was expecting." He turned a glare on Malfoy for some reason before moving to the board.

'_Well, he certainly doesn't seem happy that Gryffindors showed up his vaunted Slytherins.'_

"_Do you know why he doesn't like me much?"_

'_I'm not sure. I was actually expecting a different response to you. There are certain things that he was involved in but it seems the explanation I was preparing is incorrect. I would beg that you give me some more time to investigate.'_

"_Okay, Tom. You know best."_

'_Thank you for your confidence in me Harry, but please be careful. Remember, I can make mistakes like anyone else and I have insurmountable evidence to support that.'_

Snape put instructions up on the board and without even the most basic of explanations set the class working on the potion. Harry and Hermione quickly had their potion brewing and so started helping their nearby classmates. Harry had narrowly managed to stop Neville from a disaster when Snape came up behind them, "What's this? Chatting away instead of doing your own work then. That'll be two points from Gryffindor, Potter."

Harry gave a confused look, "No Sir, I was explaining to Neville that the cauldron needs to be off the fire before the porcupine quills are added. Is that correct, Sir?"

Snape frowned, "Well, yes. But I don't recall giving instructions to help your classmates." He took a moment to glance at Harry and Hermione's perfectly brewing potion. "However, since your potion is not a total disaster, carry on."

Harry noted that he didn't cancel the point deduction or give him any points but still he had the feeling it could have gone a lot worse.

The next Potions class the Slytherins arrived already upset about something and started to systematically try and sabotage the Gryffindors' work. Neville suffered burns when Malfoy managed to throw something into his cauldron and many other Gryffindor potions were ruined.

By the third class Harry, with Tom's help, introduced the other Gryffindors to a small warding charm to repel thrown objects. Hermione was very curious about where he had learnt that particular charm and wasn't happy when Harry told her he had promised to not mention the name of the person who had taught him. However, given that she didn't want him to break a promise and the spell had turned out to be so useful, she had eventually let it go.

Snape just ignored the actions of the Slytherins but was quick to pick up any retaliation by the Gryffindors. Harry noticed he was also much harsher on marking down the quality of his housemates' potions and Neville initially suffered most of his ire in the first week of classes.

Only four of the Gryffindors thought it worthwhile to have a study group for a class that was turning out to be mostly practical. Snape's set homework was less thought provoking than menial labour. Harry decided that Ron wasn't that keen on the subject, but was trying to prove that he wasn't an airhead like Lavender by forcing himself to study. Surprisingly, when Ron put his mind to it, he could actually do quite well. Neville continued to struggle and Harry ended up partnering with him for most study sessions and classes. Hermione partnered with Ron, though she made it quite clear that he had to be on his best behaviour or he'd be out a partner and out of the study group very quickly.


	8. Chapter 8 - Slytherins

_**Author Notes: **__Over 100 reviews now. Many thanks to all the reviewers. I enjoy reading your comments and I am very keen to hear what people enjoy most about this story. As always answers/replies to questions and comments are/will be posted at www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/_

_**Last Chapter - Classes**__: Harry decides that whilst the subjects are enjoyable not all the professors are, especially the potions professor. Harry helps organise a number of study groups some of which he jointly leads with Hermione. Gryffindor and Hufflepuff group together for Charms and Herbology. Ron has to be given an ultimatum before he behaves himself. Harry introduces some of the others students to the basics of Occlumency. Toms discovers something in the DADA classroom is causing him problems_

_****__**Update 14 July**: __Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter._

* * *

**Chapter 8 - Slytherins**

* * *

The Gryffindor's final subject was also with the Slytherins. That particular subject started a few weeks after the start of term and also, unlike the others, was held only once per week. Despite being with the Slytherins, the Gryffindors were looking forward to it except for two notable exceptions.

"Don't worry about it, Hermione. I've never flown a broom, either. They'll start with the basics."

"But there is nothing about the basics in my books. Why wasn't there a book on basic broomstick flying on the book list?" Hermione had been panicking all day.

Ron spoke up in what was obviously meant to be a comforting manner, "It's easy. Just feel it and be confident. Those things you can't learn from a book."

"Can't learn it from a book? Why can't I learn it from a book? What am I going to do?"

Harry held her gently by the shoulders. "Hermione, calm down. Deep breaths. Remember your meditation exercises." He glanced at Neville who was also looking a little pale. "Neville, you too. Breathe."

In another effort to calm Hermione down, Harry led her and the others down early and ended up helping Madam Hooch set up for the class. Under Tom's guidance, he selected the healthiest looking brooms for Neville and Hermione.

'_I wish I could close my eyes. This is going to be a disaster.'_

"_Why don't you go hide in the quiet then?"_

'_And miss all the fun? No way!' _

"_Gah.. I thought you were meant to old and wise?"_

'_Guess I've been stuck in your head for too long. Bad influence.'_

"_I wouldn't dare to disagree."_

'_Smart arse.'_ Tom's voice showed his amusement.

There was a pause as Harry tried to tweak a few tail bristles back into place before, _"Oh joy, the Slytherins are here."_

The Gryffindors and Slytherins eyed each other warily as they waited for Madam Hooch to return. Harry noticed that one of Slytherin girls looked like she had been recently crying and was standing a distance away from the others of her house. He briefly wondered if the house of snakes were having a few internal problems before giving a mental shrug. It wasn't his problem.

'_Not your problem, Harry, but possibly an opportunity.'_

"_What do you mean?"_

'_At some point, you do need to work on the Slytherin problem. Don't disregard any chance to learn more about the happenings of that house. You are already making good progress with the other Houses.'_

"_But I thought you said I should spend at least a few months to learn more about the situation before acting?"_

'_That doesn't mean you shouldn't already be gathering information and looking for opportunities. Pay attention. Watch how the others are treating her. Look, even Pansy is sneering at her and they used to be on half decent terms.'_

"_Which one is Pansy?"_

'_Honestly, Harry. Know all your potential enemies. Pansy Parkinson is the one trying to smother Malfoy. The chubby upset girl is Millicent Bulstrode.'_

Tom's voice was only mildly chastising, but Harry felt more than a little ashamed. He remembered he had promised to help Tom try and repair the damage his alter ego had caused to his old House. It wasn't that big of a deal to pay a bit more attention and Tom had helped him so much to improve his life.

'_Don't worry about it, Harry. You are still doing well. Now focus on the class.'_

Madam Hooch returned from the broom shed and switched out another of the brooms before barking out. "Well, what are you waiting for? Pick a broomstick and stand beside it with your wand hand over it."

The class shuffled around a little as the Slytherins selected brooms. Malfoy pushed his way to the front to choose a broom then changed his mind and forced one of his cronies to swap with him.

Madam Hooch called out, "Hand over the middle of the broom and say 'Up!'"

There was a mixed chorus of shouts and whispers as the students commanded their brooms up.

Harry and Ron's brooms were two of the few that went straight to their hands. Neville's and Hermione's lifted a little off the ground before falling back.

"Intent. Focus on your intent. Picture and want the broom to be in your hand." Harry told the two of them.

Neville and Hermione both took a deep breath and tried again. This time the brooms lifted to their hands though neither as energetically as Harry and Ron's.

Madam Hooch went around the class helping and correcting everyone before moving on to showing them all how to mount them. "Now, when I blow my whistle, kick off hard, Keep them steady, rise a few feet, and then lean forward slightly to come straight back down. On my whistle: three, two..."

Harry whispered to the others, "Intent. Picture and focus on a gentle and smooth takeoff and landing."

The whistle blew and soon all the students were doing short flights without too much effort. Even Neville and Hermione had got over their initial fear though, when the students got the option to go a bit higher, they both stuck to doing short hops.

Harry, on the other hand, was having a ball. He would spend a minute helping either Neville or Hermione pushing them to do longer and faster hops each time. Then he would go for a quick dash, loop or barrell roll before returning at speed to help the others.

'_You're a good flyer, Harry. It would be worthwhile getting yourself a shrinking broomstick for additional emergency mobility.'_

"_Flying is great!"_

'_When your power matures I'll teach you how to fly without a broom.'_

"_Cool. What other ways to fly are there?"_

'_In England it's just brooms or riding a flying creature. Other countries allow flying carpets. All require you to depend on something else. Flying under just your own magic is much more liberating.'_

"_Is it hard to fly without a broom?"_

'_As far as I am aware, I was the only one to do it. I developed a method, though there are stories that Merlin could do it as well. Such stories were my inspiration to developing the technique.'_

"_Cool."_

'_Actually there is one other method, but it's rare. A few people are able to transform themselves into a flying creature and fly that way.'_

All too soon the whistle was blown and Harry returned to find a crowd gathered around a fallen student. He landed next to the gathered Gryffindors to hear the crying and mutterings of the crowd.

"She was pushed."

"Who did it?"

"Goyle and Crabbe, they were both knocking her around from their brooms."

Harry glanced around and saw Hermione supporting Neville who was looking rather green. A little embarrassed that he felt so relieved to see her okay, he pushed forward to see who Madam Hooch was helping up. It was Millicent Bulstrode. Madam Hooch had already cast some sort of spell to paralyse her leg.

"Class over. Mr Potter, can you and your friends put the brooms away whilst I take Miss Bulstrode to the hospital? Everyone else dismissed."

No sooner was she out of sight than Draco summoned his broom back to his hand, "Come on, Harry. Let's have a race. First to that tree there and back."

Hermione had already gathered three brooms and snapped at him, "Didn't you hear Madam Hooch? Class is over, we need to put these brooms away. Hand it here, please."

Draco sneered, "You're not the boss of me, mudblood."

All conversation halted and there was a clatter of broomsticks as Harry, Neville and Ron dropped their collections. The silence continued as lines formed, Gryffindors facing Slytherin.

'_Harry, keep your head, they are just students. If it goes to a fight tickling, bat bogey, jelly-legs and tongue tying jinxes only. If they cast anything nasty let me call what spell to use.'_

Harry stood in the middle of the line of Gryffindor boys. Facing him was Malfoy. Goyle and Crabbe stood to either side of him with Theodore Nott and Blaise Zabini flanking them. Nott and the bookends were sneering whilst Zabini just looked slightly disappointed. Parkinson was behind Malfoy and looked ready to fight whilst Daphne Greengrass and Tracy Davis looked worried and almost ready to run.

Behind Harry, Lavender and Parvati were explaining to Hermione in whispers what was going on.

Harry spoke first clearly and slowly, "Apologise, Draco, and do it properly."

'_After Malfoy, Nott should be your second priority. Zabini's probably not going to join unless he's attacked and Goyle and Crabbe, whilst dangerous, will be slow to get started. Don't let Pansy out of your sight. She's more likely to go for the low blow.'_

Malfoy, his sneer long gone, looked into the cold green eyes and took a moment to take in the situation. No one had drawn a wand though most everyone except him had hands near them. He still held his broom and there were equal numbers.

He gritted his teeth, took a deep breath, then forced out, "Miss Granger, I sincerely apologise for my ill-considered words. Forgive me but I must take my leave."

'_Seems he isn't stupid enough to go up against superior odds.'_

Throwing the the broom down he spun around and strode away. The other Slytherins stood still for a moment, letting Draco get a few meters away before they backed away and followed him, sending the occasional glances back towards the line of Gryffindors.

Ron let out a long sigh, "Merlin's Beard, Harry. Thought we were going to go at it then and the only spell I know is _rictusempra_. Bet you they know heaps of dark spells."

Neville spoke out, "Doesn't matter. Can't let them go calling Hermione that to her face, bad enough already when they mumble it."

Harry was quiet as he approached Hermione and was surprised to find himself being hugged. "Thanks, Harry."

"Ehh.. that's okay, Hermione. Let's get these brooms away, right?"

"Of course."

'_Harry. Harry. Pay attention. You can daydream another time. The hug is over now, pay attention. This is a good opportunity to teach your house mates some basic dueling.'_

"_Fine. Fine."_

Harry handed his brooms to Dean Thomas and picked up those Hermione had dropped. "Think we should learn a few more defensive spells, Ron? Not learning anything in Defense."

Before Ron had a chance to speak up Seamus Finnigan got in. "I'd be up for that. Don't think those snakes are going to let this rest. Zabini, maybe, but did you see that look of disappointment on Nott's face when Malfoy apologised?"

Dean asked, "Didn't think Nott was one of Malfoy's group?"

Seamus shook his head "Don't think he is. Seems like a bit of a loner. Usually partners with Zabini. I think he just wanted to fight."

Very soon, everyone was showing interest in learning a few more useful spells and plans were made to get together sometime. Even Lavender agreed to come along after Parvati, who was very keen on the idea, talked her into it. "Come on Lav, us Gryffindors have to stick together. We're not going to go looking for a fight. Just want to be ready to protect ourselves and our friends."

They finally made plans to meet up behind the Quidditch stands on the weekend. It was decided once again that Harry and Hermione would lead the group. Hermione doing the planning and Harry running the actual meeting.

_-my-friend-tom-_

It was Friday, breakfast time, when Harry next encountered Draco. Harry and Neville had come down alone. Ron had been moaning about it being too early to get up and Hermione was doing some last minute revision for a test in the common room. As they walked into the great hall Draco and his two sidekicks intercepted them.

Harry was thinking he should at least make one more attempt at making peace with Malfoy and was thinking to suggest that they give the broom race idea a shot. However, Malfoy spoke first. "Potter, I'll give you one more chance to show that you're worthy of my attention. We're doing a bit of a cleanup and dropping the dead weight in my house and I think you should do the same. Longbottom's acceptable, same with Patil and Brown but the rest of your friends, they're dragging you down. Don't be a loser. Join the winners."

'_I give up. Malfoy's not worth the effort. We'll work on the Slytherins from another angle. Do as you will. Just by mindful of your audience. I'll come up with some ideas on how to break his influence.'_

Harry raised his eyebrows and cocked his head and took a few steps to the side as he considered Malfoy's words. He slowly brought his hands up and clapped slowly, "Bravo, Malfoy. I guess you were up all night writing that little speech. Yet all you've managed to do is show how stupid you really are. You and anyone small minded enough to call themselves your friend is hardly a winner. Just someone in need of the money your father throws about."

Draco was shocked, "You can't say that. I'll.."

Harry, "..go tell your father. Of course you will. I'm sure he loves having you come crying back to him every time someone doesn't treat you like the little princess you act like."

Draco was surprisingly quick on the draw. If Harry hadn't been prepared, there was a good chance he might have been too slow. Luckily he hadn't been planning on drawing his wand, instead he rapidly spread his hands shoving Neville. He stepped one way, Neville stumbled the other and Draco's curse shot between them.

Harry had positioned himself so that the student tables weren't behind him and hoped that the curse would be visible from the staff table. However Draco had shot for his head so the curse actually rose as it traversed the great hall and by the time it got to the staff table, it was at just the right height to slam into a huge metal bowl of pork sausages. There was an almighty clang as the bowl was shot into the air trailing sparks. Sausages came raining down on Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick and Professor Snape.

'_Oh my, Harry. That was impressive.' _Tom sounded rather amused.

Harry so wanted to laugh and it took all his willpower to just make sure it was only shock that showed on his face. He kept both his empty hands in view and took another small step backwards so he didn't impeded any of the staff's view from the sight of Draco frozen in shock, his wand still pointing at the staff table. Neville, Crabbe and Goyle followed Harry's lead by stepping back as well, leaving the stunned Draco in full sight of everyone.

"Mr Malfoy. That's fifty points from Slytherin and two weeks of detention. Casting curses at other students is not acceptable behaviour. Severus I take it you will be having a talk with Mr Malfoy about this."

Snape picked a piece of sausage out of his hair, "Indeed Minerva. Mr Malfoy you will report to my office now and will wait outside till I get there."

As Draco fled, the room erupted in whispering and restrained chuckling. There were many dark mutterings from the Slytherin table. Fifty points was a massive amount to lose. Harry had no doubt that Slytherin would no longer be in the lead for the House Cup, in fact he'd be surprised if they weren't dead last now. A few students left the hall on their way to check that.

The Professors cast a few cleaning spells and sat back down to continue their breakfast. Harry noted that Snape wasn't making any effort to eat quickly.

'_Malfoy is not altogether stupid. He's weak right now, but he'll be already plotting how to regain his standing. If we want to ruin his standing with the other Slytherins, it would be best to do it soon.'_

_-my-friend-tom-_

By the time Harry and his friends had finished breakfast and made it to the Potions classroom, he had been congratulated by at least thirty people. Surprisingly, most people actually knew what happened and didn't bother exaggerating the story too much. By tomorrow, the story would have started changing, but Harry hoped it'd be a long time before Draco stopped being called 'Princess'.

The Gryffindors and Slytherins ended up standing outside the locked Potions classroom in two small groups and glaring at each other. However, they kept the conversation to low mutterings within their respective houses, instead of the usual taunts. When Professor Snape strode up a few minutes late with a cowed Malfoy in his billowing wake, his expression was so dark no one dared to make a sound as they filed into the classroom.

Harry had noticed in the previous two classes that the Slytherins had rearranged their typical groupings. Malfoy had started partnering with Pansy Parkinson and Millicent Bulstrode instead of his two cronies. Before, the two bookends had usually just watched Malfoy make the potions. For the previous two classes, Crabbe and had been paired with Nott and Goyle with Zabini and, though Harry had heard a few muttered insults from the two smarter boys, nothing overt was said about the rearranging. The Slytherin's work had improved and Tom had said it was obvious Snape was now providing private lessons, probably as he found it unacceptable to have his snakes being shown up by the lions.

This class initially looked like it would keep the same groupings but when Millicent Bulstrode went to sit down next to Parkinson, Malfoy sneered, "Find another seat half.. Bulstrode."

'_Looks like Millicent might not be that useful after all. I guess her mother wasn't what her family had hoped for. Half-bloods have little sway within Slytherin.'_

Millicent glanced at Pansy but the other girl just looked away.

Snape sneered as Millicent looked around the other Slytherins who also turned their heads to look away from her, "Miss Bulstrode, unless you want to skip the class, find a seat now."

"Millicent, you can join us." Hermione's hesitant voice was quiet but easily heard in the otherwise silent room.

Millicent blinked twice, but quickly moved over to sit on Hermione's other side and nodded a quick thanks before dropping her head to stare at the table.

'_That probably wasn't the smartest move. Weasley is seen as a blood traitor and your girl is a muggleborn. Even though the others pretty much forced her to find new partners, she's not going to enjoy the reception she gets back in the Slytherin common room.'_

"_Sounds like it was pretty bad before, anyhow." _

'_I assure you, it can always get worse.'_

Harry frowned.

The class started and Hermione conducted a muttered conversation with Millicent as she enlisted both her and Ron's help in preparing and brewing the lesson's potion. Harry noted with some amusement to Neville that Hermione managed to complete the whole lesson without touching a single ingredient or stirring rod and yet their potion turned out quite well. The Slytherins had made numerous attempts to ruin their potion but they couldn't bypass Hermione's ward. It wasn't powerful but they had no way to overpower it or break it without being obvious.

On the way to their next class, Hermione told Harry about her and Millicent's whispered conversation.

"Professor Snape has set up additional Potions study sessions for the first year Slytherins. They are run by some of the sixth years for additional credit. Millicent wasn't invited as she's not pureblood."

Harry noted that Tom had been right once again, "If she's not pureblood what's she doing in Slytherin?"

"Actually, turns out most years have two or three half-bloods, but they tend to be the better students. Millicent is quite good at Charms and Transfiguration, but has a lot of trouble with Potions and Herbology. She is also the only half-blood in first year and they have an odd number of students, which is making it difficult for her."

"Ouch. So you're going to partner with her again next time?"

Hermione glanced at Ron who turned his attention to his feet.

"What happened?" Harry already had an idea so he tried to act just a tiny bit irritated.

"Well, Harry, yes. But she needs help and our study group is pretty small so I asked if she wanted to come and join us for that too. I mean, it'll be just her and the four of us. She promised she'd be on her best behaviour and..."

"Hermione, don't worry, it's fine. Right, Neville?"

Neville shrugged, "I've no problem with it. Millicent is not like the boys or Parkinson, she's usually just quiet."

Harry nodded and looked at Ron, "And you, Ron? Are you okay with it?"

Ron gave a small shrug as he continued to stare at his feet, "Does it matter? Seems like you've already decided. As long as she's not there to spy or make trouble I don't care."

Harry gave a small smile, "Well, that's decided. That's very nice of you Hermione, let her know she is welcome to join us."


	9. Chapter 9 - House Elves

_**Author Notes: **__Thanks to all the readers and reviewers. Answers/replies to questions and comments are/will be posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/ _

_Thanks to Oh I am Slain for the constructive criticism. I will keep it in mind as I review and write new chapters. Tempted as I now am to start rewriting I will refrain as that'll only end up delaying the next chapters. Fraid I'm not that familiar with the whole process to find a beta. Till I started posting this story only thing I had done here was read stories. I'm certainly not opposed to the idea of having someone proofread my chapters so if you or anyone wants or knows of someone willing to do it let me know._

_Updates over the next five weeks maybe less frequent due to personal then work travel plans. I've got a buffer of new chapters written but they still need a lot of editing and checking before they are anything like near ready._

_**Previous Chapter - 8. Slytherins**__: During flying lessons Harry helps Hermione and Neville, a bullied Millicent Bulstrode is injured and taken to the hospital, Draco insults Hermione and almost instigates a fight. At Harry's insistence Draco apologises. The Gryffindors decide to start a self study group to practice self defence. At dinner Draco attempts to curse Harry but ends up hitting a bowl on the staff table losing a large amount of points and popularity. In potions class Hermione helps Millicent and invites her to join their study group._

___****__**Update 14 July**: __Many thanks to Aletheya for proofreading this chapter._

* * *

**Chapter 9 - House Elves**

* * *

After dinner the four friends made their way down to Hagrid's hut. Since the start of the term they had managed to visit once a week though usually during a free period.

"Bit late for yeh four ter be down here ain' it?" Hagrid stated as he let them into his hut.

Hermione answered for the group, "We have been rather busy with study. We have less than an hour before curfew so it has to be a short visit this week. Sorry, Hagrid."

"Nothin' ter be sorry abou', Hermione. Always nice ta see yeh. Come in. Come in. I'll put the kettle on."

After they were settled and cradling their massive mugs of tea, Hagrid turned to Neville, "Were speakin' with Professor Sprout about me pumpkins. They need some care and she told me 'bout yeh, Neville. Dab hand with the plants. Think yeh could take a look at em?"

Neville flushed, nodded and started to rise.

Hagrid put one hand on Neville's shoulder to stop him and Neville went a little pale as he was forced back onto his chair. "Nah, too dark now. How abou' on the weeken'?"

Neville nodded, rather relieved as Hagrid's massive hand released its pressure, "Eh... Sure Hagrid."

Harry, Hermione and Ron all chuckled.

Soon, the conversation turned to their normal classes and then on to their first flying lesson. Ron related to Hagrid what happened with Hermione and Neville adding the occasional comment. Harry just listened, quite interested to hear how the others had seen it.

"Glad yer didn' get into a figh' then." said Hagrid. "No poin' gettin' yehself 'urt. Yeh gotta watch yerself around 'em Slytherins Harry. Plenty o' those kids parents wouldn' be too happy 'bout yer."

Harry nodded, "We're going to practice some defensive spells tomorrow. We need to, since Professor Quirrell hasn't taught us anything."

Hagrid shook his head, "'e can' be as bad as all that Harry."

Ron laughed, "He's worse. Scared of his own shadow, he is."

"Doesn't know much about the subject either, only what's in the textbook. I've asked him a few questions and all he does is avoid answering." Harry was of the personal opinion that it was more than a few and Hermione certainly didn't take well to having her questions not being answered.

Hagrid shrugged, "Dumbledore wouldn' 'ave hired 'im if there had been anyone better."

Harry sighed, "Don't think he could have hired anyone worse though. Even Binn's class is better."

Ron grinned, "Maybe we should get Binns to teach us."

"Oh imagine that. We would spend every week learning how to protect ourselves from Goblins." Neville groaned lightheartedly.

Everyone laughed.

After taking another sip of tea, Harry asked Hagrid, "I do wish we had a better Potions teacher. I think the class could be quite fun if Snape wasn't there."

"Professor Snape, Harry" Hermione said.

Harry just rolled his eyes, "Hagrid, how long has Snape been working here?"

Hagrid thought about it for a bit, "Started 1981 'e did. Professor Slughorn retired just before Christmas."

'_He started mere months after Voldemort was defeated and you were orphaned. Interesting. Thank you, Harry.'_

The conversation moved on to more of Hagrid's stories about what was in the forbidden forest before Hermione noticed the time and the four sprinted back only just making it to the tower as curfew begun.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Everyone agreed that the first session of their self defence study group went excellently, even if it had been rather tiring. Harry had to veto Hermione's plans quite a few times, as she seemed to think that it'd be possible to cover half the first year syllabus in a single session. Eventually, Harry set Hermione to researching a list of spells that would be useful and decided to wing the first session with Tom offering to help him come up with exercises as they went along. As it was, Tom only suggested a few minor improvements, otherwise leaving Harry to run it as he saw fit.

Harry started off by teaching them all a simple stinging hex, then separated the group into two teams and alternated one group attacking whilst the other dodged. He decided from the very beginning to not focus on one on one exercises, stating that if they wanted to learn formal dueling they'd be better learning it elsewhere. After watching the groups scattering, he took a moment to discuss it with Tom and then used an advanced charm to create two large glowing circles that hovered a foot about the grass and asked each group to remain within their circle whilst they attacked or dodged. The glowing circles were centered on a pair of small rocks that the charm was cast on so a little later he mixed up the teams and charmed the rocks to slowly roll around, asking the teams to try and remain within the moving circle as they continued the exercise. He put off Hermione's questions about the charms by telling her that such discussions should happen after the study session. That discussion never happened.

During one of the breaks, a small table appeared with cool drinks and light snacks. This, of course, brought up the question of how he had managed that particular feat.

"How is simple, I didn't create the food. I just arranged earlier to have it prepared and delivered by the House Elves."

Hermione asked. "Are they invisible? I didn't see them."

Parvati spoke up, "Nope, just very good at keeping out of sight. Part of their duty is to remain in the background and they are very good at it. Petal, my house elf, delivers my clothing in the morning in person because I asked her to, but everything else generally is done when I am not looking."

"You have your own House Elf? Are they expensive?"

Parvati shooked her head, "It's not exactly mine but the family's. We have four. Petal actually looks after both me and Padma. Not expensive to maintain, but I think it can be expensive to buy one these days."

Hermione looked confused, "Buy? What do you mean? Don't they work for you?"

Parvati nodded, "Yep, since before I was born and I don't know the details. Might have been born into our family. They are very nice."

"I don't follow. You buy their contract?"

'_As amusing as this could be, Harry, it's time to put a cork in this. Offer her a book, that'll shut her up.'_

Harry gave a mental sigh but, since he didn't actually disagree with Tom, he did cut Parvati's reply off, "Probably easier if I find you a book that explains the whole House Elf-Wizard relationship, Hermione. It's less employment and more a symbiotic relationship."

Hermione furrowed her brows in thought.

Noticing that, apart from Ron, everyone had paid more attention to the discussion than to the drinks and snacks he continued, "Everyone make sure you have a drink before we get back to it. Don't want you collapsing. Next, we'll learn a shielding spell that's effective against a few basic jinxes."

"What about if they cast a Hex or a Curse?" Dean asked.

"At the moment, dodge. We'll work our way up to shields that can block or deflect curses but they are a lot harder. Later, we can work on specific counters but you'll need to learn to confidently recognise spells before they are useful."

"Do you know them?"

Harry nodded, "I know a few and I'll teach them to you as soon as I can. Please keep that information to yourselves though." He caught everyone's eye as he said that and was happy to see them all nodding.

He paused and added, "Also I don't even want you talking about it even amongst yourselves unless you are outside. Even the walls in the castle have ears here. Literally. The portraits don't just move. They listen. As do the ghosts."

'_You could always have them swear an oath or sign a contract.'_

"_I'd prefer just to trust them for the moment and I don't want to scare them off. I'll keep that in mind though, if we get to the point where I want to show them something that's a bit more private."_

By late morning the group had some success getting the shield to work. Both Tom and Harry considered the progress good. They ended the session with a free for all foot race where the only spells allowed were the jelly legs, leg locker jinxes, their counters and the jinx shield. In revenge for working them so hard and because he told them he didn't mind, Harry found himself being attacked non stop and Lavender Brown ended up winning to much applause.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Harry spent the afternoon chilling out near the lake with Hermione, Neville, Susan, Hannah and Ernie Macmillan. After Ron joined them, they soon switched the topic of conversation to their Transfiguration homework as none of them were that interested in chatting about the recent Quidditch games. Ron soon wandered away to play fanged frisbee with his brothers.

The conversation wound down and the six found themselves lightly dozing and staring at the sky. Tom, for some reason, decided it was about time to continue the discussion about Professor Snape.

'_Okay, Harry. You wanted the story, so here goes._

_Severus Snape was in the same year as your parents and for many years was a close friend of your mother, which was unusual as he was Slytherin and she was Gryffindor. Their friendship lasted till sometime during their sixth or seventh year. He joined the ranks of Voldemort soon after finishing his study at Hogwarts. _

_When Voldemort decided to target your family, believing as he did that you were the one spoken of in the prophecy, Snape pleaded with him to spare the life of your mother. Which indicates that he still had strong feelings for your mother long after their friendship ended. _

_I am unaware if I ever learnt any details of his relationship with your father, but if I did I no longer recall it. Given their Houses - your father was also in Gryffindor - I assume that the House rivalry was a significant factor. It is possible that it is jealousy that you were not his son or misplaced anger directed at your father that is generating his current disfavour of you.'_

"_He wanted to be my father? Ewww.. I don't want to think about that."_

Tom sighed, _'I think you have missed the point. Let's just say I think his anger at events during his youth with your parents are the reason he treats you as he does.'_

"_But they are dead."_

'_Indeed. But that is not the point I am making. I had hoped to discuss this when you were calm. Maybe being drunk on sunshine and good company has addled your senses. Let's revisit this another time.'_

"_Okay, Tom. You're the boss."_

'_I've already told you, Harry, that... never mind. Have a nap and I'll wake you when you need to get everyone up.'_

_-my-friend-tom-_

Harry crept up to then peered around the corner. The corridor ahead was deserted so he took a few deep breaths before making his way carefully along it. He was slowly getting used to the strange vision provided by his glasses. Everything directly in front of him was dimly lit, like what you would expect if there were windows and it was an overcast day. However, past the edges of his glasses everything was pitch black, his peripheral vision was totally useless and it felt rather disconcerting. He found himself twisting and turning his head a lot and Harry's neck was starting to feel the strain.

'_Good, Harry. This is the door. Check for wards in the hall first.'_

A few minutes passed as Harry whispered incantations. Some of the spells he had to cast a few times till Tom was happy with the results.

'_Okay, put up the silencing wards.'_

Two more muttered incantations.

'_Better. Now check the door.'_

Harry went back to work casting detection spells. This time he spoke in a more normal voice, which made it a lot easier for Harry. He was very excited, he was on a real adventure now. He was a little surprised when he found nothing more than a basic door knock ward which he easily disabled by adding a new short stasis charm on top of it.

'_Okay, Harry. Your Alohomora should be more than enough to open the lock on this door. I'm going to start talking once you cast it and, if at any point I go quiet, pay careful attention to where you are standing at the time, cast the detection spells we discussed and get out. If I still haven't replied within two minutes after that then lockup, remove your charms and make you way back to your dorm and try calling me there.'_

Harry really wanted to say he already knew all this since they had gone over it already a half dozen times, but he knew that would just gain him another lecture in proper preparation so he satisfied himself with a muttered, "Okay, I got it."

After casting the unlocking charm he entered the room, Tom talking softly in his mind.

Later, back in bed, Tom was mulling over what it might mean that they could find absolutely nothing that seemed to have any effect on Tom or be in the least bit unusual within the classroom.

'_It could be an artifact that he carries around with him. Possibly something defensive in nature. Another option could be that he casts specific wards on the classroom before the lessons begin.'_

"_So how do we go about finding out?"_

'_Carefully. It is possible that his bumbling nature reflects more his inability to teach rather than his lack in skill as a wizard. Pretending ineptitude can be a useful defence. Detecting an artifact or magical item in a magic filled environment is a difficult skill to master so we will start with you learning how to cast the ward detecting spells silently.'_

"_But that's __really hard. I can barely get them to work when I whisper them." _ Harry couldn't stop a little bit of whine entering his mental voice.

'_Indeed. This will not be a short term project.'_

"_I've already got too many things to study and practice, I don't have much spare time left."_

'_True. We might have to cut down elsewhere, being that we can't...' _ Tom's voice tailed off.

"_Can't what? What happened Tom?"_

'_Oh nothing, I'm still here. I just remembered something that may be useful. There is an item that could help a lot and not just with this particular problem. The issue will be how easy will it be to get ahold of.'_

Harry was more interested now, _"What is it?"_

'_A time-turner. Allows magically immature individuals to exist in two places at once for short durations. Effectively allowing double the time to study.'_

"_Twice as much study? That doesn't sound like much fun and are you calling me magically immature?_" Harry was wondering if he had just been insulted.

'_Just twice as much time. It could be used for study, rest or anything else and yes Harry, you are indeed magically immature but that is both normal and a good thing. Having a magically mature core, which will happen in around five to six years real time, means that if you then tried to be in two different places at the same time it would cause serious issues. Don't feel insulted, your core is powerful, Harry, and will be even more so when it matures.'_

"_Okay... I think I understand most of that. So how do we get one of these turners?"_

'_They are sometimes leant out to students with either personal issues or particular study needs. If we could find out if any students currently have access to one, I think I could help you arrange an accident and obtain it without discovery.'_

"_You mean hurt someone and steal it? I'm not sure I like that idea."_

'_No Harry, an accident for the time-turner. If we want one before your fifth year we'll probably need to steal it and we don't want them searching for it. The time grains vanish on contact with air so all we need to do is make a realistic replica of the rest of the components and leave broken pieces of that behind.'_

"_So how do we find one."_

'_That's something I will ponder. For you I do believe it's time you got some sleep, Harry.'_

"_Okay, Tom. Goodnight." _Harry wasn't going to argue about that. Sleep sounded wonderful.

"_Goodnight, Harry."_

_-my-friend-tom-_

Sunday morning started earlier than Harry would have liked. He was still tired from the previous night's adventure but Hermione had pestered him to take her to the library and help him find some books on House Elves.

Her insistence that they leave the breakfast table early also didn't improve his mood, so he was already feeling surly as he stomped, softly, around the library in the magical creature section grabbing books. The bright sunlight flooding through the high windows seemed to tease Harry.

"Harry. It's terrible, they are slaves."

"Well yes, but it's for mutual benefit."

"It's still slavery. That's illegal."

'_Oh joy. Here we go.'_

Harry sighed, "Human slavery is illegal Hermione." He groaned remembering, "Well in most circumstances..."

"What!"

"That's complicated, but back to House Elves. They need the master-slave bond to survive. As I said, it's more of a symbiotic relationship that just includes them having to follow their master's orders."

Hermione's voice took on even more annoying whine, "I don't believe it. There must have been another way other than forcing them into becoming enthralled to wizards."

"It's just speculating that they were forced. It happened so long ago that no one knows for sure what happened."

"And that's good enough, is it? I bet you no one has ever bothered try and fix it."

"Well.. probably not, but the House Elves don't want it fixed. So why would anyone?"

"So that's it, and you also think it's okay to have them remain slaves?"

'_You're not going to win this argument, Harry. She has a cause!' _Tom almost sniggered.

Harry frowned, he would have liked for Tom to actually help, but Tom was even less concerned about House Elves than he was. He couldn't see how he was going to get the message across, "Yes, Hermione, and if you are going to try and change things you're just going to upset everyone. At least research it properly first, and not today. Look, I'm going outside. Are you coming?"

Hermione actually stomped her foot in anger, "You will not just walk away from this. It's important Harry."

Harry shook his head, "If you say so. But leave it for the moment, Hermione. Do you want me to help put these books back?"

"Don't you dare, Harry. We are going to spend the morning working on how to help the elves."

'_Yeah, right. Ignore her Harry. It does look like a lovely day outside.'_

Harry stood, "I'm sorry, Hermione. There is no way I'm spending anymore time on this. The elves are happy and if you calm down you might be able to understand that."

"I understand just fine and I am calm." Hermione said not calming down at all. "You just don't care that it's slaves that are running around doing all the work."

"I'll be outside when you calm down."

"Don't you dare."

But Harry was already walking away.

'_Well done, Harry.'_

"_Please, Tom, don't say anything."_

_-my-friend-tom-_

At lunch, Hermione sat by herself reading a book as she ate lunch. Harry and Neville saw her suddenly let her fork drop with a clatter and stare intently at her book. She quickly pulled another book from her bag and started flicking through the pages.

'_Here we go. She's just worked out that all the meals here are prepared by House Elves.' _Tom's voice was amused.

"_What do you think she'll do?"_

'_Probably go on a hunger strike.'_

"_A what?"_

'_She'll refuse to eat.'_

"_She can't do that. It's not healthy." _

'_Don't worry about it, Harry. She's eleven, she doesn't have the willpower to stick with it long enough for it to do any harm. Just ignore it.'_

Harry was still worried. _"Maybe I should try and talk her out of it."_

'_Don't be a fool. You know how stubborn she is. Paying attention to it will just make her feel like she's getting through to you.'_

"_So I should just ignore it?"_

'_Hell, yes.'_

Neville watched Hermione carefully push her plate and all the nearby food away, then sitting stiff backed and returning her attention to her book. "Harry... what is she doing?"

"I'd say she's worked out that the food here is prepared by House Elves and is now going to refuse to eat it. Just ignore her Neville, she'll get over it."

Neville looked a little confused, "She didn't think that House Elves made the food? Who did she think made it?"

Harry smiled, "Who knows, Neville. Hermione is pretty smart but she's still got a lot to learn too."

After lunch, Harry and Neville met up with Ron and the other Gryffindor boys and played frisbee whilst the girls used animation charms to make the late summer flowers sway together beside the lake. After a while, a few of the Hufflepuff boys joined the game. Hermione sat a distance away reading. She had tried to gather some interest about helping the House Elves but only Justin has shown any interest at all. However, after having a chat with Ernie, Justin acknowledged that the situation was too complicated to worry about whilst he was still at school. She had managed to upset Parvati and Lavender when, after discovering they both had House Elves, she had begun trying to lecture them on why they should set them free.

At dinner, Hermione sat by herself reading and still not eating. She brushed off Harry's occasional attempt to have her at least sit with the rest of them, engage her in conversation about something other than House Elves or to eat something.

'_Don't worry, Harry. Give her a few more days. Hunger has a tendency to wake people up.'_


	10. Chapter 10 - Quidditch

**_Author Notes:_**_ Computer and internet access a lot less convenient here than I expected. I'll post this chapter but next chapter and responses to all the reviews will have to wait till I get back home. __Thanks to all the readers and reviewers. Answers/replies to questions and comments are/will be posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/_

**_Previous Chapter - 9. House Elves_**_: Harry and Tom learn when Snape started at Hogwarts from Hagrid. Harry and Hermione run their first self study defence class and everyone enjoys learning though they only practice a few simple jinxes and a jinx shield. Harry and Tom sneak into the DADA classroom late at night carefully bypassing the wards and locking charms but can't find any clue about what has been causing problems for Tom. Time-turners are mentioned. Hermione gets upset about house elf slavery and Harry is less than impressed._

* * *

**Chapter 10 - Quidditch**

* * *

A few days had passed and still Hermione was sulking, though the hunger strike was over. She still hadn't apologised to Harry and he was getting a bit short with everyone. His sleeping had also been affected. Tom had gone so far as to suggest that he be the bigger man and go and talk to her, but Harry wasn't having any of it. He was of the opinion that he had done his best to explain the situation and it was only her stubbornness that had prevented her from listening to him. Tom hadn't bothered to pursue the topic.

They both still attended the same classes and even partnered up as per normal, but they kept their rather stilted discussions focused on their school work. In their study groups, they were barely civil to each other and overly cheerful with the others. Hermione had at least stopped trying to involve the others in her 'save the house elves' project. She spent her spare time researching, making notes and planning.

Even though Harry was spending less time being social with Hermione he hadn't gained any spare time as Tom had quickly used that extra time to have him practicing non-verbal spells. The focus was on detection magic. Complex spells to cast at the best of times.

_'Don't worry Harry, you're making progress. This magic is quite difficult and it wouldn't be expected of anyone prior to their fifth or sixth year.'_

_"Wish I could wait till fifth year. Can we go do some more combat magic?"_

_'Soon, but you do need spend some more time on general spell casting techniques first before I can teach you more combat spells. I understand you are concerned about the Slytherins, but they are still just children and are much less capable than they pretend to be. Snape is an irritation but hardly a threat. Maybe read a few more back issues of the Daily Prophet for a bit before you practice any more magic._

_"How is that a break? You have seen how many there are! It's going to take forever! I'd prefer to keep casting those stupid spells than read that trash." _ Harry knew his frustration with Hermione was making him a little short with everyone but he couldn't help it.

_'Not stupid Harry. Just difficult. Remember it's not just for sorting out the mystery about Quirrell, those spells will also help you when you go after the horcruxes. Those wards were complex and magic is rarely static. You can't just depend on my memories of those wards to get past them.'_

_"But I won't need to cast them non-verbally when I go after those."_

_'Indeed, but this practice will help improve the way you cast them verbally and nonverbally.'_

_"It's boring and I'm tired."_

_'Fine, there doesn't seem to be any immediate threats. Go borrow a school broom and practice your flying. I know you want to prepare for the quidditch trials tomorrow.'_

That brought a smile to Harry's face. His flying prowess had been noticed by Madam Hooch and he had been allowed to try out for the team. Madam Hooch had later given him the news that Professor McGonagall had said not to worry about a broom as something could be arranged if he got on the team. Madam Hooch was hopeful that meant maybe some of the school brooms could be replaced with something half decent.

After collecting his chosen school broom from Madam Hooch's office he quickly made his way towards a nearby balcony and mid step mounted and was airborne. He enjoyed the fact riding a broom felt so natural and easy.

Harry whooped as he dived towards a lone tree near the lake . He pulled a hard turn between the branches close enough that the leaves brushed his hair. He then took off straight up pushing the old broom to its limit. He couldn't imagine anything more exhilarating, though whilst he was flying his mind was empty except for the feel of the wind in his face and the sound of his robes flapping about as he pulled tight loops and barrel rolls.

After a few minutes of free flying he pulled out the three small coloured conjured marbles. He had made sure he was out of sight of anyone when he created them, as conjuring even small items was certainly not taught to first years. Harry certainly didn't want anyone to know that he had even a few basic NEWT levels spells under his belt. He released the bronze, silver and gold marbles and spent the next thirty minutes catching them in order as they flew randomly about over the deep lake.

_'Dinner time soon, Harry.'_

_"Thanks, Tom." _ Harry quickly collected the marbles forgetting the catch order he had set himself and, after returning the broom, headed down to the Great Hall.

Upon entering he spotted Hermione sitting by herself once again. She was already filling up her plate. As he approached the table she glanced up, then turned her body slightly as she made sure to face away.

Harry let loose a little sad sigh and his good mood evaporated. He sat heavily down beside Neville who greeted him with a broad smile. "Hiya, Harry. Had a good afternoon? Didn't see you around."

Harry managed a small smile back, "Hi. Neville. Finished up some homework then went flying. Pass the pork would you?"

"Sure. You going to watch the tryouts tomorrow?"

"Trying out. Hoping to make chaser or seeker."

Neville's eyes open in surprise, "Thought you couldn't join in first year?"

Harry shook his head and swallowed a piece of gravy coated carrot, "Can't bring your own broom here but you can still try out for Quidditch if Madam Hooch thinks you are able to handle it. I hear it's pretty unusual to be selected as a first year, especially since you have to be on a school broom but Oliver Wood, he's the captain, came and told me I better be there. Said that I had a good chance and that Madam Hooch suggested I was okay."

"Said you were a natural, she did." The voice came from right behind Harry.

"Best flyer she had seen in many a year, as Oliver quoted." A very similar voice came from behind Neville.

The two boys twisted to see the twins grinning down at them.

"Little Harry made one of the school brooms look like a professional broom, was her words."

"She was gushing. We'll be watching out for you Harry. Fred and I are the Gryffindor beaters."

"Indeed we are and we're in need of a good seeker so make sure you get a good night's sleep, young Harry."

The twins clapped the two boys on their shoulders then went to join their friends further down the table.

"Wow, Harry! Seekers are really cool. I'll be there cheering you on!"

"Thanks, Neville." Harry smiled but he snuck a glance down the table to the one person he really wanted cheering him one and his face fell. He caught a glimpse of her face before she turned back to her food.

_'If she's that important to you, just go say sorry.' _Tom's voice was flat and strangely emotionless.

_"But I didn't do anything wrong."_

_'Why does that matter? I take back my suggestion to forget about it and let her grow up in her own time. This whole lover's tiff over a few worthless house elves is distracting you.'_

_"It's not a lover's tiff. We aren't like that._" Harry stabbed his fork into a piece of beef hard enough to knock the plate back a little.

_'Your concentration is suffering,Harry. You know you could have done better with those non verbal spells earlier.'_

_"But you said there is no rush?" _

_'Indeed, but that's not the point. You need to either learn to ignore distractions or deal with them. Since my efforts to have you ignore this particular distraction have failed you need to resolve it. She's getting up now. Forget the meal and go talk to her.'_

_"But I.."_

_'Now, Harry!' _ Impatience was very evident in Tom's tone and Harry was more than a little shocked. He couldn't remember a time when Tom had been as forceful with his words.

He pushed his half finished meal away and moving quickly managed to get right behind Hermione as she was exiting the Great Hall. He had just managed to say, "Hermione could I have a word please," when she came to an abrupt halt forcing him to do the same.

Malfoy and his sidekicks were blocked their way.

"Well well if isn't Potter and his little _mu... ggleborn_." The sneering Malfoy slowly drew out the last word so it was obvious what he really meant.

"Get lost Malfoy. Don't want to make another fool of yourself do you?" Harry was frustrated, he had just worked up his nerve to speak to Hermione and now he had to deal with this idiot.

"You'll be the only fool when I crush you!"

"Crush me, Malfoy? Not such a coward when its three on two then. Are you going to try and hex me again?" Harry grinned.

Malfoy glanced at the open door to the Great Hall behind Harry and his sneer faltered for a moment before reappearing, "One on one then. Wizard's Duel. You and me, Trophy room at midnight. Bring a second."

Harry tried his best sneer, "You don't have a hope of winning, Malfoy."

Malfoy returned the sneer with interest, "Know the penalty for not turning up for the Wizard's Duel do you Potter?"

Harry nodded, "Of course. Now, if you don't mind, I've got better things to do than trade insults with you."

Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle roughly pushed between Harry and Hermione and entered the Great Hall. Hermione turned and glared at Harry, "You shouldn't have accepted, Harry. Wizard's Duels are dangerous."

Harry just gave her a small smile, "I didn't accept, Hermione. With his wand away and without the correct words he was only just making talk. He probably thinks I don't know the difference. It'll be a trap and I have no intention of going."

Hermione looked thoughtful for a moment as she run through the conversation in her mind, a small smile started to form but, before it got very far, it faded to be replaced by the scowl that had returned in force.

Harry's smile also faltered as he pleaded with her, "Hermione, just a moment, please. I still want to talk to you. There's a classroom just up a level that'll be quiet. Please?"

Hermione's scowl didn't shift but she motion for him to lead the way.

Inside the empty classroom Hermione snapped, "Well?"

Something flickered across her expression and Harry hoped that there might be a still a glimmer of hope in that.

"Hermione, I'm really sorry. You're my best friend and I'm sorry I argued with you. Maybe we won't always agree on everything but I shouldn't have just walked out on you like that. I still want to be your friend."

The scowl vanished, "Oh, Harry. You're still my friend. I'm.. I'm sorry too. I just wanted to make things better."

"That's okay Hermione. Nothing wrong with that but just baby steps to begin with, okay? If you want help I'm there for you."

"Thanks, Harry." Hermione shyly held out her hand.

_'Give her a hug, Harry.' _Tom's voice was casual.

Harry didn't question Tom's suggestion since it sounded like a fine idea and, ignoring the hand, gave her a very brief hug. Hermione's slight blush and big smile were a very nice reward and he smiled.

After releasing her he quickly asked, "Can we go for a walk?"

Hermione nodded cautiously before she followed him out of the classroom.

_"Thanks, Tom."_

_'You're welcome, Harry. Anything to get you focused again.'_

Harry led Hermione down two levels, "I've got something I want to show you."

_'Harry. If you are taking her where I think you are, please don't.'_

_"It's fine Tom. It'll be good for her."_

_'It'll probably end in disaster.'_

Harry didn't answer and soon led a curious Hermione to a large painting of a silver fruit bowl. He gave her a cheeky grin.

"What's this, Harry?"

"Tickle the pear, Hermione." Harry was smiling widely now.

"What?"

"Tickle the pear." Harry folded his arms and waited.

Hermione narrowed her eyes but she seemingly didn't want to upset Harry right now, so she tentatively did as he asked. Her jaw dropped as she watched as the pear squirmed, chuckled, then turned into a green door handle. She looked at Harry who made a motion to open it.

As soon as the door opened Harry grabbed her hand and dragged her inside. Hermione gasped as she entered the massive room that was as wide and as long as the Great Hall.

At least a hundred house elves were skipping about carrying dishes stacked crazily high to and from cupboards and massive cauldrons where magical brushes and clothes cleaned and dried them.

"Welcome to the Kitchen, Hermione. You won't find a single unhappy elf here unless you talk to them about taking away their livelihood. In here you can learn a lot about how they are treated and how you can improve their life without upsetting them. How about we sit down and work out a list of questions we can ask them about their life?"

The broad smile that split Hermione's face was reassurance enough for Harry to believe that this had been the right move.

"Will they mind if we sit in here?"

Hermione had no sooner asked her question than a house elf noticed them. Within moments, a dozen of the excited house elves had dragged Harry and Hermione to one of the massive tables. Mere seconds later a multitude of desserts and drinks were set out.

Harry stayed there with Hermione til curfew discussing which questions he thought were acceptable to ask the elves. When Tom alerted Harry of the time the two sprinted back across the castle to their tower once again only just making it in time.

_-my-friend-tom-_

The next morning at breakfast Harry spotted a disgruntled Draco sitting by himself at the Slytherin table. He seemed to be glaring daggers at his eggs. Crabbe and Goyle arrived a little later, but choose to sit beside some of the other first years. Harry wondered what had happened but since there was no way he was going to go and ask he decided he should just try and ignore it.

The Twins turned up just minutes before breakfast was finished, stuffed their mouths with pancakes then grabbed Harry and lifted him off the bench.

"Time to show us what..."

"...you are made of Harry." they mumbled past pieces of half eaten pancake.

Rolling his eyes at Hermione, he let the two boys half lead half drag him off to the Quidditch pitch.

Madam Hooch was already there with Harry's chosen broom and a selection of other brooms for the few others trying out that also didn't have a broom.

A burly fifth year already dressed in Quidditch robes introduced himself, "Good morning, all. My name is Oliver Wood and I am the captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team. We already have a fairly strong line up but we are short one chaser and our seeker. Still we are going to have tryouts for all positions in case there is a hidden star player amongst you lot."

He waved Fred over as he continued.

"First of all, let's get an idea what kind of flyers we have here. Everyone on their brooms and follow Fred for a couple of laps around the pitch."

The laps were followed by some weaving around the Quidditch hoops and then some dodging around a few simple balls that vaguely resembled bludgers.

Harry was having fun, he didn't care that much for the competitive part, he just loved the feel of the rushing air. More than a few times he was tempted to forget the tryouts and just fly off by himself. Still, Hermione was there with a few of his other friends to watch him so he made sure to listen to the instructions and go through the actions along with the other hopefuls. He found it all rather easy and, when it came down to chasing the snitch, the others were no competition.

Two of the boys had better brooms but Harry found he could easily push his broom to faster speeds, pull harder turns and was quickest to spot the Snitch. The frames of his glasses were a minor irritation and not for the first time he wondered if he shouldn't just get rid of them. Still, even that minor handicap couldn't prevent him from easily outperforming the others. After seeing Harry's flying, none of the other prospective seekers begrudged him getting the position and they and many others congratulated him.

He would have also liked to try out for the chaser position but by that time he felt it would have looked too much like showing off and Oliver seemed adamant that he was going to be their greatest weapon.

A pretty second year by the name of Katie Bell got the chaser position and gave Harry a big hug. "We made the team. We made the team. You're a brilliant flyer, Harry. I watched all the games and most of the practices last year and we are sure to win this year with you on the team! Oliver Wood is a great keeper, the Weasleys are dangerously brilliant and I'm so excited to be chasing with Alicia and Angelina."

"Thanks, Katie."

"Alicia only played one game last year, she was the reserve. Have you ever played before?"

"Ehh.. no. Never flew before coming here." Harry felt a little overwhelmed by the excitable girl but was happy to note that the excitement wasn't anything to do with his scar or history.

"Wow, Harry! You're a natural, then. I started learning when I was young on a kid's broom. Played a few little play games when I was growing up. My dad has taken me to seventeen games."

_'Seems like you have a Quidditch fan on your hands, Harry.'_

_"Better than a Harry fan."_

When Hermione came down from the stands Katie quickly discovered how little she also knew about the game and decided to give both Harry and Hermione a run down on various things that had happened last year and what to be aware of. Harry rather enjoyed listening to Katie as, though she was full of information, she was also was a good listener, happy to answer questions and tell funny stories.

After Oliver gave them the schedule for their first practice sessions, Katie gave Harry another celebratory hug and offered to tell him more about quidditch over dinner. Harry happily accepted, though he did notice that Hermione seemed a little hesitant.

_-my-friend-tom-_

After a fairly uneventful lunch, during which a still lonely Malfoy glared at Harry, Harry and Hermione led the Defence Self Study group through the same exercises outside the castle. They were happy to note a significant improvement. It seemed that almost everyone had taken their advice and had practised their spells at least once during the week.

Once again, when Harry decided to incorporate some physical activities in with their casting, he hit a problem.

"Come on, Harry. We are wizards, not muggles; why do we need run or exercise when we have magic?" Ron was complaining.

Harry noted that a few of the others were nodding as they wondered the same thing and sighed. "Okay let me try and explain this another way. Magic can do just about anything right?"

"Yep." Ron nodded, happily taking the opportunity to stop moving.

"And you use your mind to control your magic?"

"Yeah. I guess." Rod seemed a little unsure about this.

_'He probably thinks with his stomach.'_

Harry chuckled and got a few odd looks, "Right. Well using magic is all about intent and focus. The better you are able to concentrate your will, the better magic will understand what you want it to do. Now, a strong healthy mind has a lot more control over magic. Healthy mind, more control, better results. So, you understand the need to have your mind healthy?"

"Well, that makes sense. But you have us exercising our body not our minds here."

Harry smiled, "You think your mind is not a part of your body? Exercising any part of your body will improve your general health, including your brain and mind."

_'That's a bit of an over simplification, Harry.'_

_"This is Ron here and it's not like I haven't explained it before."_

_'Fair point.'_

Whilst Tom and Harry exchanged thoughts,Ron was working on his next point, "What about potions? Can't we just take a potion to make us fit and healthy?"

Harry smiled, it was nice to see Ron coming up with actual arguments rather than just whining. "There are a few potions that will indeed boost your strength, endurance and even your memory temporarily. However there are very few potions that can give you a permanent boost. Take, for example, healing potions, they just combine with your innate magic to return your body to its natural state."

"Can't we get some of the permanent boost potions? They sound great."

"From my readings they are either exceedingly rare, expensive or have rather nasty side effects such as increased aging, impotency, rotting flesh."

"Ewww.. What about.."

"Later, Ron. We can chat about potions afterwards. Now let's get back to it. Everyone form three teams. This time we'll work on dodging attacks from multiple locations for a bit then I'll teach you a shield for physical attacks." Harry pointed at the basket of golf balls he had brought down and grinned evilly. The others shuddered.

The rest of the class proceeded without incident and by the end of the afternoon everyone had the Jinx shield working well and Harry had added tripping and slipping jinxes to the end race, which Seamus won. Next week he planned on adding some obstacles.


	11. Chapter 11 - Potions

_**Author Notes: **__I'm back from holidays. I've posted my replies and comments on reviews on Chapters 8, 9 and 10 at www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/ or tiny cc/ff-mft (Add full stops to complete either web address... Does putting the replies there work? Do people read them? Should I just stick them at the beginning or end of my chapters instead?) _

_**Previous Chapter - 10. Quidditch: **__Harry spends more time practicing his detection spells. He makes up with Hermione, apologizing for abandoning her and offering to help her even though he doesn't fully agree with her cause. He introduces Hermione to the Kitchen and the Hogwarts House Elves. Malfoy tries to trick him into coming to a 'wizards duel' but Harry sees it for what it is. At the quidditch trials he gets the Gryffindor Seeker position and meets the rest of the team including Katie Bell. He introduces the Defense Self Study group to shields that work against physical attacks._

* * *

**Chapter 11 - Potions**

* * *

It was the second potions study group with their newest member and once again Ron was being difficult. He wasn't rude but he certainly wasn't very friendly to their newest member and it was getting on everyone's nerves.

"What is your problem, Ron? You're almost as bad as Snape!"

"What? I didn't do anything."

Harry just snorted, "You need to learn to stop with your thoughtless comments. Just cause some of the Slytherins are stupid gits doesn't give you the right to deride the whole house,especially now. In case you've forgotten, Millie is in Slytherin house."

Ron just shrugged, "Millie's not as bad as the others."

Hermione punched Ron in the shoulder hard, "Not as bad? Not as bad? Listen to yourself, Ronald Weasley. You're as thick as a brick."

Ron paused and then slowly looked at Millicent, "Eh.. yeah.. Sorry Millicent. You really aren't like the others, I just.. yeah I don't think before I speak much."

Millicent just nodded her head still bowed, "It's okay, Ron, it's nothing."

Harry shook his head, "Hardly nothing, Millie. We don't want you get upset with us."

"Never, Harry. Even if if you weren't nice this is so much better than being in my common room."

Hermione asked, "Why? What's wrong with your common room."

Millicent shook her head, "Nothing. It's okay."

Hermione had tried a number of times but hadn't managed to get Millicent to speak of what was happening in her house. She'd been seen a number of times with red eyes but every time had refused to talk about it. But Hermione was persistent and tried again, "Come on Millie, we're friends now. You can tell us and maybe we can even help."

Harry, Neville and Ron all nodded.

Ron added, "I'm really sorry. Look, I promise I'll do my best to think before I speak."

Millie looked nervously around at the four Gryffindors, "Friends?"

They all nodded and smiled at her.

"I'm not sure I should, what if they found out I spoke about it?"

Harry spoke up, "None of us will say anything you don't want us to, Millie."

After the others agreed, Millicent started telling them about all the pushing and verbal abuse she and the other half bloods were enduring now. It seemed that all the half bloods in the lower years were being targeted. Only those in fifth and above were mostly immune to all but a few sneers and muttered insults.

Millicent didn't say it, but the others got the impression that she bore the worse of it since she had no support in her year group. With Tom prompting him, Harry led the conversation towards the worst offenders and eventually into discussions about the different factions.

Harry was most interested when Millie started to talk about Malfoy.

"Draco wasn't very popular for a few days because he lost a lot of points playing some sort of stupid trick on Filch over the weekend. However, one of the third years needed to suck up for some family reason and once one person stopped treating Draco like a leper everyone else caved. Was almost nice for a few days, Daphne and Tracey would even be nice to me when Draco wasn't around but now it's back to just being the same as it was and Draco is always in the common room again.

Millie went quiet and the girls comforted her before the study group turned back to their potions homework.

As the others started comparing their sources, Tom admitted to being very pleased that Millicent was so observant and that they had been able to learn a lot about what was happening inside his old house.

'_That was all very useful Harry. Well done.'_

"_It was mostly Hermione."_

'_Well I can't exactly go thanking her can I, now?'_

"_Haha very funny, Tom."_

'_So it sounds like Snape and Malfoy are at the root of all her troubles. I can understand Malfoy looking for a new target since he's having little luck baiting you directly, though I'm not sure why Snape is encouraging this behaviour unless he's trying to curry favour with Malfoy senior.'_

"_Why would he do that?"_

'_Apart from the money and connections Malfoy cultivates, he probably is also a good source of the more difficult to obtain ingredients for his potion research.'_

"_Wish we could do something to get back at Snape." Harry's hated being unable to fight back._

'_Well Harry. I think we should.'_

"_What? I thought you wanted to keep a low profile and work out how to influence him slowly?"_

Harry could imagine Tom nodding,_ 'I did but I no longer think that's the best way to proceed. We still need to keep a low profile but I think it's time to neuter Snape.'_

"_Neuter?"_

Tom paused a moment before answering, _'Damage his reputation so he loses influence with the Malfoys. If we can weaken Malfoy junior's influence at the same time it'd be a nice bonus.'_

"_How do we do that?"_

'_Most of the board members have relatives attending Hogwarts, including Malfoy senior. If news of Snape's poor teaching techniques was made public it would cause him problems. We'll need to gather or plant evidence.'_

"_More sneaking about at night?"_

'Yep.'

Harry grinned_ "Sweet!"_

_-my-friend-tom-_

Harry had planned to have a nap before his ward breaking expedition, but he was having a lot of trouble sleeping. He was still riding on a high from a highly enjoyable charms study session. He decided he really liked Susan, she brought a lot fun to the group. They had come up with a game where they used charmed marbles to try and knock their opponents marbles off the table. Susan and Harry had quickly proved that they were the most adept at the game and after eliminating the rest of the group had spent five more minutes laughing and trash talking whilst their marbles fought. They finally declared it a draw as their last marbles fractured into tiny pieces, both still on the table.

Harry was still staring at the roof when Tom spoke, _'Time to go, Harry.'_

Harry cast his stealth spells and, after checking that the curtains on the other beds were all closed, left the Gryffindor tower careful to neutralize the wards and watching paintings on his way out.

'_Homenum Revelio.'_

Harry cast the spell on the hospital wing and was pleased to confirm that there had been no new patient admitted during the afternoon and that Madam Pomfrey was away. He only hoped his luck would hold and that there would be no late night emergency. He had a backup plan, but wasn't fully confident that he could pull it off undetected.

It was only a matter of minutes before he had bypassed the alarm wards. They were set to alert the nurse if someone needed attention and were quite simple. The wards on Madam Pomfrey's office were a little more difficult but he managed without verbalising the required spells, keeping Tom happy.

He was shocked by the sheer amount of records on potion related injuries over the past twenty years.

'_Looks like you have a fair amount of reading ahead of you.'_

As Harry started duplicating the journals he asked, _"Isn't there some magical way of collating all the info?"_

Tom considered his question for a long time before answering, '_Not that I know of, but there is no reason why it couldn't be done. I would suggest creating some sort of intelligence to read and process the information. An item similar to the highly intelligent headmaster portraits or the sorting hat with the capability of reading and writing could do it, though such would be difficult to create.'_

"_How difficult?"_

'_I imagine with my help the work of three to six months full time research. Though I believe I could provide a better estimate after the first month.'_

"_Oh.. no quicker method?"_

By the time Tom replied Harry had completed copying the potions journals and had started copying a few textbooks on healing spells that he hadn't seen in the library. Two of them had wards versus copying so he had had to bypass those first.

'_Another possible method would be to create an occlumency avatar to do the work and create a spell to inscribe it's internal writings on to parchment.'_

"_How long would that take?"_

'_The spell would be easy enough, I already know a spell to write thoughts out on parchment. It would just be a matter of adjusting it slightly. I believe that with proper effort you could have such an avatar created within three to four weeks.'_

"_Hang on a moment. You know a spell that I could use to write my essays by just thinking about what I want to write? Why haven't you taught me that yet?" _Harry was a little shocked that such a spell could exist.

'_Well, you needed to improve your handwriting.'_

Harry thought he detected the faintest hint of hesitancy in Tom's words. _"And?"_

'_Okay. I didn't think of it. I'll teach you as it would free up a lot of your study time to train. Your handwriting is already good enough, anyhow.'_

"_What other spells would be useful that you haven't told me?"_

'_If I knew that, I would have already taught you Harry. Finish up and let's scout out the wards on Snape's office.'_

Harry shrunk all the copies, dumped them in his bag and reset all the wards before leaving.

As expected, the wards on Snape's office were much more extensive than those on the hospital. Harry took careful note of what they were so they could recreate them and practice without risk. They already knew that Snape's office was going to be much more challenging and were happy with their progress. Due to Snape's quarters adjoining them, their plan was to raid it during a senior year double session. There was going to be a lot of risk and hence a lot more planning before they made the attempt.

The next night, Harry started working on creating a new Avatar in his mind to handle the sorting through of twenty years worth of potion related accidents. He first had made an effort to read through the records himself but had quickly realised that using the Avatar would not only be a whole lot more accurate, but also faster and so much less boring.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Harry was one of the first to notice the six owls carrying the long thin package into the Great Hall during breakfast. When it was deposited in front of him with a letter he opened and read it.

'_Interesting.'_

"_I'm not sure I understand. It's very cool but first years aren't allowed brooms. Why is it being delivered to me?"_

Neville asked politely, "Should I ask?"

Harry just shrugged and handed him the letter.

'_This is bound to cause problems and she must know it.'_

Harry quickly took a big mouthful of his omelette and got up. He shook his head to the questions he was being asked as he headed back towards his dorm.

Sadly Malfoy hadn't bothered to finish his own breakfast either and intercepted by the doors. "If that's a broomstick you'll be in trouble." He smiled evilly and moved to block Harry again.

Harry frowned, "Grow up, Malfoy."

A familiar voice came from behind Harry. "A Nimbus Two Thousand. Wow Harry that's like a professional broom. You're so lucky." Neville had obviously passed the note on to Ron. Harry regretted not getting it back. Ron was fine in small doses, especially when he wasn't speaking.

Malfoy smirked, "So it is a broomstick. Wait till I tell..."

Harry sighed, Malfoy was nothing if not predictable. "Your daddy? Yeah make sure you have a little cry whilst you are at it."

"Why you dirty.." Malfoy started reaching for his wand.

Harry was wondering if he would ever learn when Professor Flitwick appeared between them.

"Not planning on casting another hex there, are you Mr Malfoy?"

Malfoy's hand moved quickly away from his wand, "No sir. Was just about to let you know that Potter's got himself a broomstick."

Professor Flitwick turned and smiled at Harry, "So I heard. What model is it, Mr Potter?"

Harry smiled back, "Nimbus Two Thousand Sir."

"Nicely done. I'm looking forward to seeing your flying. Minerva has so been raving about how good you are. Be warned though Ravenclaw has a very good team this year. Run along now and make sure you take good care of it."

Laughing at Malfoy's shocked expression Harry, Neville and Ron headed back to the dorm to examine the broom. They could still hear Malfoy complaining to Flitwick about the unfairness of it as they made the second staircase.

"_You mean problems like that, Tom?"_

'_Jealousy, yes. He's going to be doing his best to make it known you are getting special treatment. Sadly he won't be wrong.'_

"_And you think Professor McGonagall did it on purpose?"_

'_Maybe, then again she is a quidditch fanatic so maybe it's purely for that reason. I'd love to know how she got around the rule. Maybe you could ask her after your next transfiguration class.'_

By lunchtime it was obvious that most of the school had heard of Harry getting special permission to have a broom. Surprisingly there wasn't a whole lot of fallout. Even Ron hadn't made a big deal about it once Harry had promised to let him have a ride on it that afternoon.

Harry got his chance to ask Professor McGonagall about the broom and she let him know that she had approached the Headmaster about getting a few of the school brooms upgraded so Harry could borrow a half decent school broom, but the Headmaster had been more than accommodating and had suggested and then given permission to use the Gryffindor's club funds to buy Harry the broom.

'_I could understand McGonagall pushing to help her team win but Dumbledore suggesting it? That makes no sense.'_

"_Do you think he's trying to cause problems for me?"_

'_I don't know, Harry. He was Gryffindor but I doubt his house loyalty would stretch that far. Maybe he's using it as an excuse to provide you a broom that could get you out of danger quickly. I'll teach you how to add permanent shrinking charms to it. It's not an easy task, especially with a high end broom, but I can direct you without having to explain all the theory.'_

"_When will I learn the theory?"_

'_The basics during fourth or fifth year runes though no one here's going to teach you how to add enchantments to a high end broom. Breaks all sorts of laws.'_

"_Oh."_

_-my-friend-tom-_

Tom had set Harry a new project that Harry was very excited about. Getting revenge against Malfoy during potions, though, that wasn't exactly how Tom had presented it to him. Tom had explained the whole purpose behind the project it but all Harry could focus on was that he was going to feed Malfoy some some of his own medicine. He hoped it tasted foul.

The hardest part of the project had been coming up with methods that would make it extremely hard to point the blame at Harry or in fact at any of the Gryffindors. Key to it would be only using wandless magic. So Harry had had to work very hard practising and improving those skills. He was glad it was for a good cause. Tom still declared that his wandless magic still wasn't strong enough to affect a mature wizard, though admitted some of his spells were now strong enough that they would be of use against squibs and young wizards. However, for this project, they had decided to focus on indirect magic such as levitation, heating, cooling and stasis charms as such spells wouldn't need to work against Malfoy's innate magical resistance and would be more difficult to detect. Switching spells would have been very useful but the potions classroom was warded against them.

Next hardest had been learning how to carry out the sabotage without looking Malfoy's way. They spent hours evaluating, testing and ruling out various scrying spells before finally settling on using a small silver mirror with a powerful notice-me-not applied to it. It was a small risk, even though Harry hadn't found any wards against enchanted objects inside the Potions room.

Harry started off small. Knocking small amounts of already measured ingredients off the table and making minor modifications to the temperature of Malfoy's brews. He also tweaked Nott and Crabbe's potions as well, though not to the same extent. There were no explosions or melting disasters but the resulting brews generally varied from poor to ruined and Harry was pleased to see Snape lose it more than once at Malfoy, Pansy, Nott and Crabbe. He would have liked to hit Goyle as well but that would have meant targeting Zabini and he had nothing against the boy. He was happy that Tom had suggested also leaving Daphne and Tracy alone as well. He told himself it was just because they hadn't actually done anything overtly against the Gryffindors.

It was midway during the second week of the Malfoy Potion Project that Harry managed his first epic success. Malfoy, like the rest of the Slytherins, always prepared their ingredients and lined them up in the order they would need them. So after he had purposely knocked a jar over gaining everyone's attention and a sneered remark from Snape, it was a simple matter to look down in shame and using the mirror and a levitation charm to switch two of Malfoy's prepared ingredients that looked vaguely alike.

"Clumsy as your father, Potter. Be glad it didn't break or I'd have you cleaning cauldrons for detention."

"Sorry, Sir." Watching the ingredients changed place right under his Malfoys sneering face it was a struggle not to smile.

Snape sneered, "Sorry? I doubt it. Get back to work and be more careful."

Hermine and Millie sent him small sympathetic smiles before turning back to their potion. Ron was still glaring at Snape. Neville was making small encouraging noises as he rechecked the weights of the ingredients still to be mixed. Harry was rather pleased to have such friends. Even Ron was a good guy to have at your side when you had an obvious enemy. Sadly, without an obvious enemy present, Ron's ire tended to randomly land on anyone around.

Harry had just adjusted the heat when a loud sizzling and popping noise from behind him heralded the beginning of the show. It sounded right nasty but his and Tom's careful checking seemed to suggest that the new mixture would be highly caustic but not explosive.

"Malfoy. What is happening to your potion?" Snape strode towards table as Malfoy and Pansy both kicked backwards sending themselves and their chairs flying.

Snape was quick to cast a shielding spell around the cauldron and everyone ducked in preparation for the explosion that didn't come.

"Curses. What did you do Malfoy, Parkinson?"

Everyone stood up as and stared as the cauldron seemed to melt inwards and flop over the flame putting it out. Within moments it was just a bubbling mixture of green and red goop that was sinking into the table.

It took Snape two minutes to find a stasis spell that managed to halt the sinking mixture which had by that time started slowly eating into the stone floor.

"Someone must have put something in my cauldron Sir." Malfoy spoke up boldly turning a nasty smirk at the Gryffindors. "Weasley was quite close to it."

Snape however was examining the remaining ingredients lined up neatly on Malfoy's table.

"You fool. You mixed up the ground oak and the ground griffon feather and put the oak in first."

Malfoy shrunk back against the back wall almost tripping over his chair. "No, I can't have. Weasley must have swapped them."

Snape looked back down at the table, "Hardly likely, Draco. Even if he had the intelligence enough to know the difference there would be particles mixed in. The griffon feather sample is pure and there is no dust trail beside it. You idiot. I'm getting tired of your poor excuses for substandard work and now this. Detention for a week. Now get out of my sight."

A white faced Malfoy grabbed his books then fled the room.

Snape shouted, "Back to work and I better not hear a single word from any of you."

'_Well done Harry. Another two weeks and we will be ready for the big finale.'_


	12. Chapter 12 - Halloween

_**Previous Chapter - **__Millie talks about what's been happening inside Slytherin. Harry breaks into the hospital wing and discovers the number of records is more massive than he thought. He starts working on an mental avatar to help him sort through the records. Harry and Tom become somewhat suspicious that he is personally given a Nimbus two thousand by McGonagall. During potions Harry begins sabotaging the Slytherin's works culminating in a Snape blaming Malfoy for a rather impressive potion failure._

* * *

**Chapter 12 - Halloween**

* * *

"You clumsy fool! You ruined them!" Ron was not having a good day and when Millie accidentally scattered the pile of dried crushed Chanterelle into the other ingredients he lost it.

Millicent teared up and with fled the room sobbing.

Ron grunted in frustration, "Ah hell, Millie. Sorry... don't go..." he turned to look at his friends who were staring at him, "What? I just spend near an hour preparing all that! What's wrong with her today?"

Hermione sighed, "Millie had a real bad night last night. She and another Slytherin were locked out of their dorm till early morning."

Ron sighed as he got up and left the room, "Ahh bugger. Didn't know that. I'll go get her."

After watching him leave the room Hermione looked at Harry and shrugged, "At least he's trying."

Harry sighed, "True, I guess. I'll grind up some more Chanterelle and Dragon skin for them. Can you separate the other ingredients out?"

Whilst Neville continued to carefully stir his own practice potion, Harry and Hermione replaced the ingredients for the second potion. When it was obvious that even if Ron and Millicent returned there wouldn't be enough time to complete the potion they carefully packed the prepared ingredients away using stasis spells to keep them fresh.

Ron returned a few minutes after they had finished and immediately started packing his and Millie's books away, "She wouldn't talk to me."

Harry raised his eyebrows, "You apologised?"

Ron rolled his eyes and gave an exaggerated sigh, "I tried. Ended up yelling at her through the girls toilet door. Lost two points. Stupid prefect."

"At least you tried." Hermione stated.

"Yeah well, it's just hard you know. Thinking first is alright for you brainy types." Ron hefted both bags onto his shoulder.

Hermione opened her mouth to speak but Ron quickly cut her off. "I know, I know, but later, alright? It's dinner time and I don't want to miss any of the feast."

Neville chuckled, "Have you ever missed any part of a meal, Ron?"

Ron nodded, "Yep. In my second week I got lost and only managed to be there for half of the dinner."

Everyone laughed.

"_How can he eat so much and not turn into a Dudley?"_

'_Magic, Harry, magic."_

"_Haha, very funny, but really?"_

'_He's burning a lot of magical energy using that wand of his. I would suggest we teach him and Neville how to properly focus using a foreign wand but then he might just turn into a Dudley.'_

"_So if he got a new wand then he'd get fat?"_

'_Maybe, though if he keeps up the exercise or refuses to eat like a bottomless pit he may remain his only averagely chubby size.'_

_-my-friend-tom-_

During dinner Ron kept glancing towards the Slytherin table and muttering.

Eventually Hermione asked, "Do you want me to go check on her?"

Ron had just opened his mouth to answer when the doors to the great hall slammed open with a loud bang.

Professor Quirrell sprinted quite fast between the student tables till he was in front of Dumbledore before gasping out., "Troll.. in the dungeons.. thought you ought to know."

Then he fainted. collapsing to the floor.

As Dumbledore began directing the prefects and professors to escort the students to their common rooms Ron, Neville, Hermione and Harry shared horrified looks.

Ron was first to speak, "I'm going to get Millicent."

Hermione was already standing, "You'll need me."

Harry nodded, "I'm with you. Neville, can you let a teacher know where we going and that they should make sure no one else is in a toilet?

"Right." Neville stated and was instantly moving.

"Come on, let's go. Wands out." Ron headed out the door. Hermione and Harry close on his heels.

The three sprinted up two flights of stairs and were smacked in the face by a foul stench.

"Ewww!" Hermione spluttered.

Ron and Harry glanced at each other and spoke together, "The troll!"

They moved as quickly to the next corner and poked their heads around to spot the huge grey creature stooping as it pushed its way through a small doorway.

"Damn, damn, damn!" Ron swore, his knuckles going white as he gripped his wand tightly.

Hermione gasped, "That's the girl's toilet."

They stared frozen until a scream forced them back into action. Ron let loose a roar as he led the charge down the corridor and into the girl's toilet. Harry and Hermione scrambled to keep up.

Inside the narrow room the smell was suffocating. The foul creature was now standing up and towering above them. Its twelve foot height dwarfed the stalls, but was still short of the tall ceiling. Harry entered just in time to see the troll swing its massive club around, demolishing half of the row sinks and two stalls. Debris bounced off the walls and water started spraying from broken pipes. With the way partially cleared, it moved towards Millicent, who was cowering at the far end of the room.

"_Tom, which spell should I use? I need a spell that won't hit Millicent too."_

The club destroyed two more stalls and some more sinks as it closed on Millicent. Ron and Hermione both sent yelled jinxes at the Troll. Both just fizzled as they contacted the troll's skin. The troll didn't even notice.

"_Tom? Tom, can you hear me?"_

The troll was close enough that Millicent was now within range of the clubs swing, though one stall partially shielded her. Hermione yelled out a shielding spell whilst Ron swore before casting another jinx. The club came swinging down destroying another stall before it glanced off the glittering shield. The shield collapsed in a shower of sparks and Harry watched as Hermione gave a faint sigh and slumped to the ground. Ron's jinx fizzled.

"Damn it, Harry. Help us!" Ron screamed and tried another screamed a different spell, "Wingardium Leviosa!"

The spell grasped hold of the club and the troll roared and held tight preventing the club from flying away.

Ron grunted and fell to one knee as he concentrated on the spell. He whispered barely loud enough to be heard above the splashing water, "Help me."

Harry blinked and repeated Ron's spell, "Wingardium Leviosa!"

The Troll roared even louder as the club finally broke free of his grasp and flew across the room towards Harry and Ron. Harry gritted his teeth, narrowed his eyes and focused his anger on the flying club. The club responded by turning and heading back towards the troll. As it flew through the fountains of water it accelerated.

There was a loud thud and crunch as it slammed its heavy end forward into the troll's forehead. The troll moaned a strange "Huh?" before it and the club toppled. The troll landed covering the ruins of three of the stalls.

Harry heard Ron coughing and turned to see him on all fours, gasping trying to catch his breath. He seemed to be okay so Harry quickly moved to check Hermione. Kneeling he gently touched her face and her eyes fluttered open for a moment. Hermione gave him a faint smile, she tried to say something but nothing came out before her eyes closed again.

Ron struggled back to his feet using a broken pipe to help and unsteadily made his way to Millicent. He used the remains of the sinks to support himself as he made his way. He clumsily climbed over the legs of the troll and slumped down into a seating position beside the shaking girl.

"Eh.. hi Millie.. I'm sorry about before.. I'm the idiot. Not you." Ron sighed and slowly toppled over landing with a splash and faint thud in the water.

"Ron? Ron?" Millie started crying as she shook him.

Harry shook his head, "He's okay, Millie. He and Hermione are both just exhausted."

A gasp came from the door behind Harry.

"What the..." Professor McGonagall face was white as she took in the fallen children and the massive troll. She quickly moved to Hermione and started casting a spell.

Harry spoke in a quiet voice, "Just exhausted. Hermione held a shield as the troll hit it. Ronald pulled the club out of the troll's grasp with the levitation charm."

Professor McGonagall briefly nodded as she continued to cast the same spells over Harry, Ron and Millicent. Only when she had finished the spells did she let out a relieved sigh. By this time Harry noticed both Professor Quirrell and Professor Snape had entered the room behind him. The expressions on both professor's faces were unreadable.

"What on earth were you all doing in here fighting a full grown troll?" Professor McGonagall had straightened up and her expression had darkened.

Harry rubbed his eyes as he answered, "Millicent was in the bathroom. Ron and I came with Hermione so that she could warn her."

The troll let out a low moan and shifted a little.

"Severus, Quirinus, please see to that creature." Professor McGonagall snapped as she cast flotation and then drying charms on Ron and Hermione. "Mr Potter are you able to assist Mrs Bulstrode?"

As Harry helped Millicent walk out the door he noted a trail of smeared red blood entering the room. He paused and his gaze followed it to the training edge of Snape's robe. There he saw a patch of dark dampness and something strange with how the bottom of the robe hang. Professor McGonagall called out and he hurried to catch up with his floating friends, Millicent still clinging to his arm.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Harry's insistence that he was fine fell on deaf ears and, when Madam Pomfrey pointed out the three bleeding scratches on his forearm and face, Harry realised that nothing he could say was going to work. He hadn't even noticed that he had been hit by some of the flying debris. Both Hermione and Ron had also been hit a few times and they were also magically exhausted. Millicent was physically unhurt, just still a little wet, cold and in shock. Madam Pomfrey had their robes transfigured into hospital gowns and in bed before Harry could think up any sort of counter argument about how small the scratches were. He regretted not noticing them earlier and patching them himself.

Harry and Millicent were allowed to keep their wands near them, with the admonishment that if they used them for anything frivolous they would be confiscated like Ron and Hermione's.

Tall ever-filling glasses of water with a mild sedative were placed on their tables and they were informed that if they weren't asleep by half past nine she would be bringing them a sleeping draught.

"Thank you, Harry." Millicent whispered once Madam Pomfrey had retreated to her office.

"It was mostly Ron and Hermione, Millie. I froze." Harry whispered back. It was starting to sink in how close it had been and how ineffectual he had been at the start.

"Still, if you hadn't led them to me..."

"Again it was Ron, Millie. We just followed him."

"Ohh.." Millicent went quiet, leaving Harry to his own thoughts and worries.

"_Tom? Tom? Can you hear me?"_

He waited a few minutes before trying again.

"_Can you hear me, Tom? Do you need help finding your way back?"_

It was closer to ten and he was pretending to sleep by the time he finally got a response.

"_Can you hear me, Tom? Please come back!"_

'_Harry. I can hear you. Call again, please.' _Tom's voice was faint and far away.

"_Tom! I was so worried. Are you okay?"_

'_I'm fine, Harry. Thanks. We were talking about Ron getting fat and then the darkness came back. I fled to the quiet and for a moment all was okay, then the dark came on stronger and I had to move further into it. Too far. What happened?'_

Harry took a few deep breaths. He needed to be honest, though he knew Tom was going to be far from happy at his poor performance.

"_Professor Quirrell discovered a troll in the dungeon. He came into the hall to warn us. Ron, Hermione and I went to warn Millie but the troll had already found her. Hermione managed to cast a shield spell and saved Millie, but knocked herself out. Ron used the levitation charm to pull the club out of the troll's grasp and I used the same spell to knock the troll out with the club. Ron was also exhausted."_

'_You didn't get hurt?'_

"_Just a few scratches. But.. but I froze. I didn't do anything for ages. If Hermione and Ron hadn't been casting spells, Millie would have been dead before I did anything." _Harry's body shook slightly as he repressed the urge to break into sobs.

'_You were scared?' _Tom didn't sound upset, just curious.

"_I guess. I was trying to call you and you didn't answer. I just didn't know what to do."_

Tom was quiet for awhile, _'This is my fault. Tell me what spells you considered using?'_

"_Confringo, Expulso, Bombarda and Reducto but Millie was behind the Troll and the room was so narrow I couldn't use those."_

'_All effective spells if you care little about causing damage to property or others. Sadly, that reflects more on my state of mind when I practised those spells than anything else. I will review alternatives for facing magically resistant creatures and for dealing with situations where friends are in the line of fire. You should sleep now, Harry.'_

"_But I froze when I couldn't speak to you."_

'_I think that was just because I have taught you too narrow a selection of spells for that particular event. Don't worry about it, Harry. I'm sure you did your best.'_

Harry didn't answer for a while. He didn't really think that was the case but he couldn't think of any words to express his concerns so in the end, as he yawned, he just said to Tom, _"Goodnight."_

'_Goodnight, Harry.'_

_-my-friend-tom-_

Neville was beside his bed when he woke and already talking before his eyes had even fully opened.

"Harry, everyone is saying that you and Ron knocked out the troll. Did you really?"

Harry yawned and blinked a few times as he grinned at Neville. The room had curtains drawn and was only partially lit by the sun outside.

"Yeah, I guess so. We both used the levitation charm to hit it with its own club. Are Ron and Hermione okay?" Harry sat up and looked towards the area where they were but it was curtained off. He could see Millicent still sleeping just past Neville.

"Yep. Madam Pomfrey said they are both fine and will wake up a little before lunch time. So, what happened?"

Harry related the details of the event excluding his attempt to talk to Tom during the battle. He told Neville that he just couldn't think of a useful spell. Neville was supportive, but Harry wasn't reassured.

'_Don't worry about it, Harry. I'll help you work on improving your repertoire and also try and work out why I was pushed back into the quiet. I have some more ideas that we can discuss later.'_

Harry sent Tom a mental nod and addressed some of the chocolate frogs that Neville had brought in.

"Thanks, Neville. I think I'm just going to have to study harder. Learn more spells. Did they work out how the troll got in?"

Neville shrugged, "They announced at breakfast that one of the outer doors' lock had been broken, but some of the senior years said there are wards that are meant to prevent trolls and other creatures even approaching the grounds."

'_Indeed. Such wards are part of the permanent ward scheme of the castle and only the Headmaster and the Keeper of the Keys can disable them and then only temporarily.'_

Madam Pomfrey walked out of the curtained area and gave Harry a quick smile, "Let's just do a quick diagnostic and then you can go out and meet up with all your friends outside. Please see if you can take them away."

Neville grinned as Madam Pomfrey started casting spells on Harry, "We've been taking turns since breakfast coming in waiting for you to wake. Potions was cancelled as Professor Snape is busy investigating the troll still."

"Did they say anything about how Snape was hurt?"

Neville frowned, "He got hurt? I didn't hear that, he wasn't at breakfast which was when they announced the class cancellation and mentioned he was busy investigating still."

'_He was hurt, Harry?'_

"_Yeah Tom, he was bleeding from the leg, I think. He was trailing blood and the bottom of his robe was bloodied and I think maybe the robe had been quickly repaired as it didn't look right."_

'_Tonight I think we should conduct our own investigation.'_

Soon Harry was allowed to use the hospital showers and change into a set of casual clothes that the house elves had brought down for him. By the time he was ready, Millicent had also got up and was in the girl's bathroom. He waited and the three of them left the hospital together to find all of the Gryffindor first years, the quidditch team, Lee Jordan, Susan, Hannah and surprisingly Tracey, Daphne and Zabini waiting outside.

The Slytherins were sitting a little distance from the rest and looking rather uncomfortable but that faded as they came forward to check on Millicent. Harry was soon retelling the story with Millicent adding her own comments, mostly rather complementary words at how Harry, Ron and Hermione had saved her. Both she and Harry skipped over the reason for why she was in the toilet.

As they waited in the hallway just down from the hospital entrance, a few other first years from various houses and some of more second year Gryffindors visited. The story had to be told a few more times, though Fred and George were now doing most of the retelling with Harry and the others only interrupting to correct some of the wildest exaggerations.

When Ron and Hermione were finally released from the hospital, the entire group trekked down to the great hall to hear the story again from them as they waited for lunch to be served.

Harry had noticed, since becoming the Gryffindor seeker, that many of the second and third year Gryffindors would introduce themselves and occasionally spare a moment to chat or just greet him. Quidditch had turned out to be a great bridge between the years within his house. Now some of those had brought their friends from the other houses to come over to be introduced and and hear the story. While mostly Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff, there were also three third year Slytherins.

Tom was very pleased with what was happening and told Harry so, Quidditch and the troll were helping Harry bridge the barriers between the years and the houses faster than he could have ever hoped for. Still he also admitted to being rather concerned, there were so many questions about what was happening within the school that he had no answers for. This was not the first year of schooling for Harry that he had expected or planned for.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Once everyone was asleep and Ron snoring loudly Harry left the dorm under his silencing and notice-me-not charms. It was a pain having to dodge or cast spells on every individual portrait but so far all he could achieve with the disillusionment charm was to make himself look like a large blob of water. It would certainly hide his identity, but not his presence.

The bathroom was now partially blocked off. At least someone had cancelled all the charms on the pipes that had been creating all the water, though very little else had been done to clean the room. The floor outside, however, had been scrubbed and the trail of blood was gone.

This wasn't unexpected and Tom quickly taught Harry the charm to reveal blood stains. Without any actual blood present, the charm wouldn't be useful to identify who the blood belonged to but that wasn't important in this case. Harry was able to keep the charm running for only about thirty seconds whilst walking so he found himself having to cast it five times before it led him to a door on the third floor corridor.

A series of detection spells showed a rather strong alert ward and a very simple locking charm. A charm that could easily be opened by the simplest and lowest powered unlocking charm.

'_If that isn't an obvious trap my name isn't Tom. Check deeper, Harry.'_

Harry cast a number of more complex detection charms. He cast them first non-verbally then switched to verbally casting them to make sure they worked properly. He was pleased to see that apart from the charm to detect fire spells he was able to cast them all non-verbally the first time.

'Well done, Harry. Next week I suggest you try a few during Astronomy for practice in a classroom setting. Now do a temporary redirection on the alarm ward and let's very carefully see what's on the other side of this door.'

Harry decided a few seconds was long enough to stare at the massive three headed dog before he quietly closed the door.

'_That certainly was unexpected.'_

"_A giant three headed dog? Why the hell would they have one here?"_

'_It's a cerberus. A magical guard dog presumably guarding whatever is through that trap door it's standing above. They are famous for their magical resistance which is why they make such great guard dogs for wizards. At least it's chained so it can't get out of the room.'_

"_It wouldn't fit through the door."_

'_I wouldn't be so sure of that. Hogwarts is an extremely magical building and they would have had to bring it into that room somehow, expanding doorways isn't that complex an enchantment and wouldn't have been detected by the charms you cast earlier.'_

Harry took an involuntary step back from the door.

'_Not to worry Harry, I would imagine that until you took a step inside that room it wouldn't pay you any attention. Let's take a moment and I'll teach you how to cancel the redirection and then add a second target for that alert ward. We can work out how to get past the cerberus later.'_

"_Get past it? Why would we want to do that?"_ Harry certainly wasn't keen on that idea at all.

'_I want to know what is important enough that they would risk bringing a cerberus into a school and how it involves Severus.'_

"_I'm not sure I want to know."_

'_Enough of that Harry. Where is your sense of adventure? Okay let's get started on modifying this ward.'_

* * *

_**Author Notes: **__This and the next chapter have progressed rather slower than previous chapters. Thanks as always to Aletheya for proofreading. Replies to reviews posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/_


	13. Chapter 13 - Snape

_**Previous Chapter - **__Ron, Harry and Hermione rescue Millicent from a troll. Harry becomes upset about his performance when he didn't know what to do and couldn't ask Tom. Harry and Millicent are mostly unhurt though Ron and Hermione take a short while to recover from magical exhaustion. Harry notes Snape was injured and uses magic to lead him to the cerberus._

..

* * *

**Chapter 13 - Snape**

* * *

By dinner time the day after, they were comparing the best stories they had heard of the troll incident. Harry's favourite had him riding on the back of the troll with his wand up its nose.

As he turned to grab some another bread roll he groaned. He was still smarting from the pummelling he had received during the morning's defense study group meeting. He had pushed everyone hard and himself harder and had, in a successful effort to stop Ron's complaints and inane questions, swapped out the golf balls with bludger sized balls. They hit just as hard but it did seem to satisfy Ron.

His thoughts about the session were interrupted as Hermione grabbed his arm and cast a spell on it. The pain faded. "Hey that worked. You find a new bruise healing spell?"

Hermione shook her head, "Not yet. That was just a numbing spell."

Harry glanced down at his arm, "Oh well. Keep looking."

He attempted to stab another potato with his fork and fumbled it.

Hermione grimaced, "Oh yeah. It did also mention that the spell might affect coordination."

Harry glared at her, though without much anger, as he swapped the fork to his right hand, "Cross it off the list. That's no use in a fight."

Hermione absently minded scratched off the spell from the list she was working through and then took another bite of her dinner returning to eating with one hand whilst reading with the other.

Neville pushed away his plate and groaned, "I need to eat less. Hey Harry, are you going to be going home for Christmas? Think you would be allowed to come over and visit sometime?"

"Yeah. That'd be great, already got plans for Christmas and New Years but any other days would be cool." Harry was pleased that Neville was keen to have him visit.

"Excellent. I don't normally get to invite friends over."

"What about for your birthday party?"

Neville shook his head unhappily, "Gran handles the invites."

"Oh? Who does she invite?"

Neville sighed, "Our relatives and her friends. Once she invited Mrs Bones and Mrs Abbott so Susan and Hannah came over. That was nice."

Harry raised his eyebrows but didn't comment. It seemed strange but then his home situation wasn't a model of normality either.

The discussion turned to what kind of things everyone wanted for Christmas. Harry had already decided which books to owl order but he was keen to hear what interests people had, books every year wouldn't be appropriate.

_-my-friend-tom-_

A week passed since the Troll incident before Tom finally declared that Harry was ready to make an attempt on Snape's office.

'_Okay, Harry. Snape and the class have gone in. Are the alert wards clear?'_

"_Yep. No one is near or approaching."_

'_Go. Good luck.'_

Harry got to work. He felt rather exposed standing in the hallway outside of Snape's office wand out and casting spell after spell on the door working around the layers of wards and charms. In his pocket he had a handful of dungbombs in case he was caught. Tom had coached him on layering lies so that if he got caught he could hopefully make them think it was all in the form of a practical joke or petty revenge.

Twenty long and worrying minutes passed before he disabled the last ward and gently pushed the door open. Snape's office was quiet and cold. Harry ignored shelves filled with jars of preserved ingredients and moved straight towards the desk.

He frowned when he discovered it to be a plain table with no drawers. A quick examination of the piles of paper on the desk was also unsatisfactory.

"_It's all just student's work. No diary, no lesson plans, or anything useful."_

'_Hidden, then. Use magic.'_

Harry gave another nod and closed his eyes and cleared his mind of distractions. He started casting his detection spells and tried to feel more than just view the resulting auras. Ten more minutes and he finally worked out that half the shelves were illusions covering up rows of books and journals. Harry paused in shock at the sheer number of books before he got to work disarming the newly revealed wards and traps.

"_Well organised, at least. Here is what we want, an expanding journal for each year level. What happens when I cast a duplication charm on an expanding journal?"_

'_You'll get a rather thick journal back. Better check just how many pages are in each journal before you cast it in case it's not just his notes. Don't want a book that is taller than the room.'_

Harry was pleased to find that the journals just contained Snape's notes for the past ten years on each year level. The resulting copies were heavy and unwieldy in their natural state but easily shrunk and lightened. Harry moved on to the other books. A great many were fairly standard fare though he happily copied the few standouts. Then he discovered another section of journals where the prior organisation broke down. The books were also bound in a variety of techniques, some rather amateurishly.

Running his eyes along the rows of books reading the titles he noted, _"There are just a whole lot of names here. Personal journals?"_

'_A lot of these were from Voldemort's collection. Taken from his victims. Snape must have looted the library after Voldemort's fall.'_

Harry absentmindedly nodded as he continued reading the names. Then he froze staring at one very familiar name.

There was a long pause before he asked, _"How?"_

'_I don't know, Harry. They should have been put under stasis charms at the house or moved to the family vaults.'_

"_I don't want him to have them."_

'_Okay. Let me think for a moment on the best way to do this.'_

Harry waited staring at the three journals in question for a long minute.

'_Okay, Harry. Copy the books with just enough power to have the charm last till Christmas day. We can use the concealing charms to disguise them as real books until the copy charm fades.'_

"_So that they'll just disappear? I like it but won't it be obvious that I took them?"_

'_Not if you copy them all over permanently conjured paper and then have the lot burst into flames before the charm fades. The fire will break the copy charm but you'll still end up with ashes and it'd be difficult to realise that the ashes never had ink on them.'_

Harry froze for a moment as he worked out what Tom's plan entailed, finally a broad smile stretched across his face.

It took three more visits over the next week and a half to copy and replace the entirety of Snape's library. There was one worrying moment when someone paused outside the office during one of Snape's lessons. Luckily the individual just left a note for Snape rather than waiting for the end of the class and Harry was able to escape in time. Learning how to set up the fire took a lot of time and there were plenty of mornings where Harry was barely able to stay awake in class.

For Harry, the worst part of this new plan was that Tom no longer thought it would be a good idea to modify Snape's lesson plans, as any investigation might reveal that the other books were copies.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Quidditch season finally began as Winter took hold of the castle. Warming charms and heavy quidditch robes were essential in the freezing air. Harry and the team took to the air for a warmup an hour before the game, though everyone agreed there wasn't much warming up to be had. At least the sky was clear of clouds and the wind was just a mild breeze.

At eleven the stands were packed and Harry was to see many of his friends in Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff also sporting Gryffindor flags.

After a not-so-stirring speech by Oliver Wood the team took to the air, Harry at the lead riding his Nimbus two thousand. Harry's nervousness at the game fell behind him as fast as the ground. Flying on the Nimbus was pure joy. It took a mere thought to have the broom twisting and turning in the air causing a few of the spectators to gasp. Everything that he could do with a school broom he could do at twice the speed and with almost no effort on the Nimbus.

Tom had taught him how to push and overpower the brooms flying charms, skills that usually only professional quidditch players managed to master. Harry had been hesitant about using them in a game even though they were perfectly legal, it had seemed a little unfair, but then Tom had pointed out that it was highly likely that the other quidditch players knew about the charms as they were hardly secret and they had probably all tried to learn them. Harry confirmed that both the Weasley twins had tried and Katie Bell at least knew about them. She was very impressed that he was taking the game so seriously and had also pushed him to try and learn them as soon as he mentioned them. She herself gave up trying after only a few half hearted attempts, she was much better at transfiguration than charms.

The game started well with Gryffindor taking an early ten points lead on Slytherin and Alicia was attempting to score a second goal when the nimbus suddenly lurched down. Harry glanced around wondering if perhaps someone had grabbed or hit it, however Terrence was a good distance away and the Weasley boys were keeping Marcus Flint busy with both bludgers under their control.

'_Hang on tight, Harry. I can feel something.'_

"_No kidding, I felt it too."_

The broom lurched again, this time to the left and Harry was glad he had tightened his grip as he still almost slid off.

"_Tom!" _If he hadn't been gritting his teeth he probably would have spoken aloud.

'_I feel the darkness Harry, it's distant but more directed. I've lost sight. Can you see Quirrel?'_

Harry would have replied but the broom suddenly left his control totally. It twisted and dived and starting zigzagging. Harry was about to lose his grip when he remembered that he was still overpowering the brooms charms. He pulled back his power and the broom slowed enough for him to regain some measure of control.

The bucking slowed and he had the impression that it was just gathering strength as it prepared strike again. Still mindful of Tom's request he gave the teachers stand a quick glance and hoped that it was enough for Tom to see whatever it was he was looking for.

The expected return of the jinx sent the broom into a crazy dive straight down towards the ground. He could hear shouts and a few screams and the distorted voice of a panicked Lee Jordon over the sonorus charms.

'_Overpower the control charms. Just like I taught you except don't meld with the existing ones.'_

Harry screamed the incantation as he headed straight for the ground, he pumped power into the charm until he felt control return to him. Not full control but at least enough that he could fight back. Turn, he commanded and the broom obeyed and he was shooting along the ground, feet skimming the grass and the screams now so loud as to be near deafening. The broom next veered towards the stands so he responded by turning it to go straight up. It started to rotate and he slowed it down. It speed up so he directed it away from the stands.

'_It's a powerful jinx, Harry. Continuous cast and I'm now sure it's Quirrell casting it and... someone's trying to counter it now. You just need a brief interruption, cast a flash spell.'_

Harry could feel the opposing control on the broom flicker in and out as another force came into play. He spared another quick glance at the stands as he prepared to cast the flash spell when he noticed some sort of commotion happening. Whatever happened caused both Quirrell and Snape to lose focus and as the jinx lifted and Harry took back control.

'_I saw a flash from the stands then.'_

Harry now remembered that Tom had said he had lost sight earlier. Frowning he turned to check on the rest of his team and spotted the snitch floating alone in the middle of the pitch. The Slytherin seeker, Terrence Higgs along with most of the players were still staring at Harry and by the time the other seeker realized that Harry was playing again it was too late.

With a light thud his hand slapped into the fast flying golden ball. He had it and he had won the game. The thrill of victory washed away all the fear and concern that had been flooding his mind mere moments ago. He felt that if the broom was taken away from him right now he could probably just walk on air, he was so happy.

'_Well done, Harry. Now get somewhere safe.'_

Harry lifted his hand into the air and joined in the cheering that had erupted all around him as his team flew towards him. Remembering what Tom said he led his team towards the ground and quickly dismounted as they neared him.

His team rushed forward cheering to surround and hug him. Harry was near deafened by the yelling but Tom's voice still easily heard in his mind, _'Keep alert, Harry. I don't expect anyone will try anything in this crowd but then... just keep alert.'_

Harry tried to pay attention but it was hard to stay aware when dozens of people were clapping his back and shaking his hand. Harry soon was swept away and was found himself being carried towards the Gryffindor Common Room.

It took a while before Harry came down from his high to really pay attention to what Tom was trying to tell him.

'_It was Quirrell casting the Jinx and Snape that was casting the counter.'_

"_What? Why?" _That caught Harry's attention.

'_I could only guess. Quirrell, no idea yet, and Snape, well he is an exercise in contradictions.'_

"_Snape is on my side and Quirrell is trying to kill me. That just seems backwards."_

'_I'm not sure, but it could be as simple as Snape doing his duty as a teacher. He was the most adept teacher in the stand to recognise and counter such a Jinx.' _Tom paused for a moment before continuing, _'as for Quirrell, at the moment all I have is more questions.'_

"_Questions? What kind of questions? Isn't there anyway to prove he was the one that cast it and get him sent to Azkaban?"_

'_It's not that simple, Harry. For starters, why is he trying to kill you? What have you done that could have upset him so much? Only two possibilities come to mind. Defeating Lord Voldemort is hardly likely, Quirrell wasn't a death eater nor any sort of ally. Killing the troll? Again if it was just a distraction as I am thinking it would really make little difference who was the responsible party for defeating it. It was just an expendable pawn. My concern is that it's me that he is after.'_

Harry paused his face a mask of shock and surprise but everyone was still so excited by the win that no one noticed anything unusual, _"You? What do you mean?"_

Tom almost gave a mental sigh, _'Well, we already know that I can't be around in his presence. Possibly he has detected me and has decided I am too dark to survive or it could be that he thinks you are somehow evil because of my presence. That seems less likely. Remember, his position is Defense Against the Dark Arts professor and I am essentially the product of the darkest of magic. He doesn't act like a strong proponent of what he teaches, however all this does is lend more credence to the theory that his stuttering and weak willed behavior is just an act. I'm sorry, Harry. I never expected my presence to put you in such danger.'_

"_So what do we do?" _Harry was wondering if there was anything he had to do right now as he really just wanted to return his focus to his still cheering housemates.

'_I don't know, Harry. Stay alert for the moment whilst I plan. The defences you have already put in place will continue to serve you well. I don't believe he is aware that his actions were noticed. Maybe indicate your suspicion of Snape to your friends in case any rumours get back to Quirrell.'_

"_Sure, that won't be hard. I mean, it's a whole lot more believable that Snape was the one casting the Jinx.'_

By the time Harry was half pushed half carried into the Common room the party had already started. The Twins were handing out drinks and snacks. Harry enjoyed a couple of butterbeers as Katie regaled him of tales of the match from her vantage point.

"Then Alicia did a feint towards Angelina but underhanded it to me around her back as she turned and I was free to go straight in. Bletchley didn't know where to look. I passed it to Angelina and she put it in. Was great." Katie raised her bottle and clinked in against Harry's.

"Almost wish I was in the crowd." Harry grinned.

"Hell no. You were great just where you were." Katie raised her head as a figure crossed in front of their couch. "Hi Angelina, come sit with us."

She scooted across pushing Harry into the side of the two seater couch freeing up some room that Angelina dropped into. Harry wondered a little at Angelina's curious look but suddenly found himself distracted by the warmth of Katie's body as it pressed into his side.

"I was just telling Harry about your goal and Alicia's great underhand back pass. Had Bletchley looking like a fool."

Angelina sniggered, "Did you hear what Flint said afterwards? Told him if he didn't keep his eye on the quaffle instead of us that'd he curse his balls off."

Katie laughed, "Ouch."

Harry shivered, that sounded like more than ouch.

Katie wrapped an arm around Harry's shoulders, "Hey Harry, don't you worry. We'll look after you."

A blush formed on Harry's face, "Eh.. thanks."

"Hey Harry, do you have a moment?"

Harry looked up to see a slightly frowning Hermione with Ron hovering behind her, "Eh Sure. What is it?"

Hermione twisted her mouth up and gently bit her bottom lip as she glanced at Katie and Angelina, "Well, it's kinda private. Sorry Katie, Angelina."

Harry shrugged, "Okay... I guess." He gave Katie a quick look and a small smile, "I'll be right back."

The slight frown that was also forming on Katie's face quickly disappeared, "I'll save your seat."

Harry's blush brightened as he followed a still frowning Hermione and a confused looking Ron to an empty part of the room.

"What's wrong, Hermione?"

Hermione glanced around before whispering, "It was Snape. He was the one Jinxing the broom."

Harry raised his eyebrows in surprise, "He jinxed my broom?"

She shook her head, "Not jinxed, Harry. Jinxing. I saw him muttering as he stared at you when your broom was acting crazy. When casting a Jinx on a powerfully enchanted object at a distance the Jinx will fall immediately after the spell is completed. Therefore to keep it active the caster must keep line of sight and continually recast the Jinx. A broom is a powerfully enchanted object and he didn't look away once."

Harry frowned, he needed to handle this carefully, "But wasn't just about everyone staring at me then?"

Hermione gave a small sigh, "But he was also muttering and when I set his robes on fire the broom started acting fine straight away."

Harry blinked in surprise, "You set his robes on fire?"

"It was absolutely brilliant, you should have seen it, Harry. She snuck up under the stand and cast that fire spell and then got out of there clean." Ron was grinning madly.

Harry sniggered as he looked back to Hermione, "You set a professor's robes on fire? Who are you and what did you do with the real Hermione?"

Hermione grimaced, "Haha... but, yeah, and I knocked over a few others as I got away. Wasn't exactly a clean escape."

Harry pursed his lips, "So you think Snape was trying to kill me?"

Hermione shook her head, "Maybe just trying to hurt you. I'm sure he could have cast a cushioning charm or a levitation charm on you if you fell."

Ron nodded, "Yeah. I think he was just trying to make you lose. Bloody Slytherins always cheating."

Harry blinked. He hadn't been expecting that.

'_Seems like they have done your job for you. Now don't keep Katie waiting for you. I think she's hot on you.'_

"_Is not. She's just a friend and happy because we won."_ Harry did his best not to blush.

'_Right. You can lie as much as you like to yourself but I can tell.' _Tom almost sniggered.

Harry shook his head as if to dislodge Tom before refocusing on Hermione and Ron.

"Do you think we should tell anyone?"

Hermione grimaced again, "Well, I think we should but I'm not sure who yet. I'm not sure we can prove it and also... well what I did..."

Ron laughed, "Hermione doesn't want to get into trouble."

"It's not that, it's just that I don't think anyone will believe us without some sort of evidence."

Harry nodded, "Okay. Well thanks for saving me, Hermione. Whatever he was trying to do I'm sure it would have hurt." He gave her a big hug. "Might do a bit of work on countering Jinxes tomorrow if I can find anything about them beforehand. You both okay for Defence Club tomorrow?"

Both Hermione and Ron nodded. Hermione pursed her lips, "Shall we go to the library after breakfast?"

Harry grinned, "Sounds like a plan. Thanks again. Now let's get back to the party."

He led the way back to the party and squeezed in beside Katie who was already patting the small space beside her. Hermione and Ron moved towards the snack table still talking in whispers.

Even the concerns he had about Quirrell and Snape couldn't dull his happiness tonight and his broomstick was now definitely has favourite possession.

_-my-friend-tom-_

In potions class Snape continued to act the same as he had always. Harry just didn't understand it. Still he didn't let it interfere with his continuing reign of terror on Malfoy. One tricky piece of transfiguration modified the base of Malfoy's cauldron base to create a barely noticeable unevenness in the thickness. Harry kept up with the tweaking of the ingredients of Nott's and Crabbe's potions but was happy to see that the single spell on Malfoy's cauldron was good enough to make sure all his potions barely made acceptable quality. Who would have thought cauldron thickness was so important.

The beauty of that spell was apparent when Millie reported Malfoy receiving a Howler from his father berating him for his terrible performance and bemoaning the waste of money of the tutoring he received in the subject before Hogwarts. Harry would so have loved to hear it but the Howler was delivered to Draco in the Slytherin common room. Still, Millie's stand up performance including shouting and waving of hands had the whole of the potions study group clapping and cheering her on.

Even Ron, who had been overly polite since the Troll incident, relaxed a little and told her how brilliant her performance was.

A week of Snape's normal behaviour and Harry had all but forgotten Snape's attempt to save him at the Quidditch game and was keen to get back to work on his downfall. Unfortunately, Tom still didn't think it was the right time.

'_Let's wait till after Christmas and his books and notes are destroyed. That'll work in our favour as he should be very distracted and busy in the new year rewriting all his session lessons._

"_But I want to hit him in the classroom now."_

'_I know but it'll be much more effective if we can hit him from multiple angles at the same time. A single attack is much easier to dodge or block than three.'_

"_I know, but I'm so sick of him and his insinuations."_

'_And now you are quoting Hermione, the walking thesaurus.'_

"_Leave off. She hasn't done anything to you."_ Harry said without much feeling.

'_I wouldn't think having to listen to her daily reporting of how little she has been able to find on the plight of the house elves is nothing.'_

"_Well it is a bit strange don't you think? I mean you told me that... hang on.. you told me about the different house elf contracts.. where did you find that information?"_

'_Voldemort had access to the libraries of many of the death eaters, which library I'm sorry I don't recall. I was researching how to create the Dark Mark at the time.' _Tom answered a little reluctantly.

"_What does the Dark Mark have to do with House Elves?"_ Harry was now really curious.

'_Voldemort... I was looking for a way to ensure my followers' loyalty to myself. I had thought the House Elf bond would be a good example to work from. However, I gave up when I discovered that there was so little information about the bond available.'_

"_Oh. Why didn't you tell me that?"_

'_It didn't seem important. You are not the one wasting your time looking for information that isn't there.'_

Harry thought for a moment, _"And I guess I can't tell Hermione that either without telling her where I learnt that from. Damn."_

'_Indeed.'_

Hermione, at least, was now only discussing her House Elf research with Harry. Harry had explained that popular movements to change things only happened when they were popular and that alienating everyone with lectures about things that really didn't have much impact on preteens wasn't going to achieve anything useful and was likely even counterproductive, another word borrowed from Hermione. Hermione had almost blown up at him before Harry managed to convince her that he was not saying her ideas were wrong, just her implementation and that he would help with that.

He also quickly shot down her idea of trying to trick the house elves into becoming free by leaving clothes out for them by explaining that such an underhanded move wasn't likely to gain any sort of nationwide acceptance. Harry was glad that Hermione didn't get upset when he argued his point and won, his friend had thankfully become a lot more accepting that other people had alternate views.

_-my-friend-tom-_

As the Autumn term drew to an end, the focus in class turned towards revision for the end of term tests. Happily for Harry and his many study groups this meant they had more spare time as, apart from Hermione, they all felt they were well on top of the material. Harry had for the previous month started to encourage everyone to work on little side projects to share amongst the group as a kind of small competition. He had offered a small box of four butterbeers or half an hour on his Nimbus two thousand for the best project. The idea was met with much interest and Harry thanked Tom for yet another of his ideas.

The prize for the Defense Study Group went to Dean, who came up with a kind of wanded hockey where the teams used their wands and a low powered banisher to propel a grounded quaffle around the pitch. This game soon become a lunchtime favourite amongst the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff boys.

Hermione's project, about the affinity of different types of wands to other users, whilst very dry allowed Harry to ask a few pointed questions about Ron's and Neville's wands. Neville was a bit worried about talking to his Gran, but said he would. Harry doubted that and knew that Ron wasn't likely to be able to afford a new wand. So he led the rest of the group in putting in for vouchers for wands and a basic kit from Ollivanders for both of them. He was rather pleased with getting that sorted and also having an alternative for the books he had planned to buy them both. The books, he could get them for their birthdays. And it all happened because he had carefully made a few suggestions to Hermione when she despaired over picking a topic for her little project. Still, it was a pity she had to make it so dry.

_-my-friend-tom-_

_.._

* * *

_**Author Notes:**__ Replies to reviews posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/ __Thanks to Aletheya for proofreading._


	14. Chapter 14 - End of First Term

_**Previous Chapter -**__ Harry breaks into Snape's office and discovers his mother's journals amongst many other's Tom believes were stolen from Death Eater victims. He copies them and leaves temporary copies in their place. Harry plays in the first quidditch game against Slytherin. During the match Quirrell casts a Jinx on his broom whilst Snape tries to counter it. Hermione interrupts them both and Harry catches the snitch winning the game. Hermione continues her quest for more information on house-elves._

* * *

**Chapter 14 - End of First Term**

* * *

It hadn't been an easy task, but Harry was confident he would place between fifth and seventh in for the end of term tests for his year. The tests themselves weren't especially comprehensive, useful or even important as far as final marks went. Harry treated them as a practice run for later more important tests and exams. Still, Harry didn't take the task lightly, he had a plan and he was going to stick with it. By second term in his third year he was going to be the top student and not a moment earlier.

He had decided to be top in Defence, fourth or fifth in both Transfiguration and Charms, go poorly in History and Potions and moderately well in the rest. The decision to be top in Defence had been made for a few reasons. It'd support his progress with the Defence club and, also, he had yet to risk breaking into Quirrell's office, so he couldn't easily check on the quality of the other students' work. Quirrell's office adjoined his quarters and was the closest to his classroom of all the professors. Also that the door had the most simplistic of wards on it just seemed way too suspicious.

Flitwick's office had been the most challenging to scout. The wards had not been especially powerful but they had been supplemented with many varied and creative charms. Every piece of furniture and even a number of floor tiles had dormant animation charms just waiting their chance to set upon an intruder. There was nothing dangerous, but any noise would have triggered off a near untouchable sound ward that Flitwick had inscribed along the back wall. That each animation charm had a separate trigger made it the work of many nights before Harry had gotten close enough to add a bypass and then to add himself to the exception list and then hide his presence from anyone who viewed the list. It was a dangerous play, as it did leave evidence of his presence, and he had done his best to trap the wards to collapse if it looked like anyone was going to break the concealment charm and discover his identity.

The end result of all the ward breaking was that he now had access to the test results of all the students in the school for all the core subjects except Defence Against the Dark Arts. Now he could make sure his tests results were just what he wanted them to be. He was rather surprised to discover that the results for his year's practicals were significantly better than the previous five years.

"_Tom, why are all our year's results better? Even those not in our study groups are still showing better practical results than the previous five years."_

'_It was a powerful year that you were born in, Harry. The second most powerful this century.'_

Harry's confusion was obvious, _"A powerful year? What's that mean?"_

'_It's a rather complicated topic that combines astronomy, arithmancy and ritual magic. The power of dates, numbers and the cycles of magic. Your birth year doesn't just determine your age, but also influences your connection to magic. For example people born in one month will all have a slightly different connection to transfiguration magic than those born in another month. The differences are typically very minor and almost impossible to define or measure. I know your year was a powerful year because when Voldemort heard of the prophecy he put a great deal of effort into determining all the relevant factors that might come into play. Hence the reason you were chosen as the most likely child mentioned and why he attacked on that particular night and time.'_

"_So everyone born in 1980 is going to be a powerful witch or wizard?"_ Harry wasn't sure if he thought that was a good thing or not.

'_Not exactly. It also depends on many other factors, health and power of their parents, their parents' birthdays, time and location of birth, siblings, to name just a few. However, overall, there will be predominantly more powerful wizards on average that year.'_

"_Is that why you said I should encourage the second year Gryffindors to create their own study group rather than let them join ours?"_

'_One of the reasons, but the main reason was just that I didn't want the group to get unwieldy. You have strong control of the leadership of the current group. A group with a lot of older students would likely see more contention over the leadership and direction.'_

"_But Katie wouldn't fight over leadership."_

'_Maybe not, but McLaggen would, and if you start cherry picking within a year you would lose respect.' _

Harry nodded. He could have liked to have Katie study with them but had listened to Tom's advice when she brought the idea up.

Tom obviously followed his line of thought as he continued, _'How about next time you speak with her you offer her and whoever leads their group to come and watch how you run a session. That is if they do manage to get their group off the ground. That way you can control exactly what you teach that session.'_

Harry didn't think that the seconds years were likely to get that far.

_-my-friend-tom-_

After the tests were completed Harry resisted the impulse to break into all the offices again to check his results early, he would get them after the break with everyone else and mere curiosity was not a worthwhile reason to risk getting caught, slim though the chance was.

Potions was the last test and Harry didn't bother faking his skill, he just didn't try hard. He already knew that Snape would mark him down no matter what. He didn't care, not even Snape's leering and hovering could change the fact that it was the last afternoon of classes for the term. He had already arranged a light picnic with all the first year Gryffindors, followed by broom relay races around the lake. Katie and the Weasley Twins were on his team and he thought their biggest threat would be a team made up of Hufflepuff fourth year girls that he had seen practicing the previous weekend.

"Potter!" Snape's sudden words right behind him had no effect. Harry already knew that Snape had moved there and he continued to carefully and slowly add the dust fly wings.

"Yes sir?"

Snape, slightly flustered by the lack of reaction floundered for a moment before asking, "What colour do you call that? Have you forgotten the basics of the potion already? It's supposed to be yellow."

Harry glanced at his acceptable if not perfectly yellow potion before looking past Snape at Malfoy's cauldron. He frowned as he concentrated, "Sorry, sir. Is it meant to be a glowing yellow like Malfoy's?"

"What?" bellowed Snape as he spun. Harry had already wandlessly stirred up the bottom of Malfoy's potion causing the potion to go critical. Harry hadn't actually planned to sabotage Malfoy's potion in this class, but he couldn't resist using the distraction Snape had provided him. In fact, if it wasn't for the fact that Snape had tried to cause this same reaction in Harry's potion by startling him he probably wouldn't have even thought of it. Pity he couldn't thank Snape for the idea.

The potion started to spit just as Snape vanished Malfoy's potion. He glared at Malfoy but only snapped, "Start again." before he strode back to the front desk.

Harry sighed, at least Malfoy would have to finish late. If that had happened to Harry's potion he probably would have got an automatic fail. As he left the classroom with the other students he had to fight the urge to smirk at Malfoy. His new strategy of just ignoring the boy actually seemed to upset him even more than putting holes in all the pureblood's poorly worded insults and jeers.

Hermione quickly caught up with him, "Do you think it's a bit strange that Malfoy's doing so poorly at potions now? I mean, he used to be quite good and we already know that he had lessons before Hogwarts and gets extra lessons."

Ron laughed, "Who cares, Hermione? It just shows us that that stuck up ponce was never as good as he pretended. He was probably cheating at the beginning of the term."

"I'm not sure about that, Ron. I've been watching him and he seems to be doing everything right. His potions just don't work out. I've looked but I haven't seen anyone throw anything into his cauldron, but I wonder…"

Ron was quick to respond, "If anyone was I would say good on them. Hell, if it wasn't for Harry's little potion protection charm he would be still throwing stuff into ours."

Hermione nodded and gave a little grimace, "I'm not saying he doesn't deserve it, though revenge doesn't really teach anyone anything. But I haven't seen that and I've been watching using a little mirror and I'm certain that's not what is happening."

Harry started, and quickly moved to shift his backpack to cover up his surprise. Hermione had been using a mirror to watch Draco just like he was and he hadn't noticed. "When did you do that? I didn't see you with a mirror."

Hermione gave Harry a little smile, "I used a little notice-me-not on it so no one would notice. It's a spell I had to look up. I can teach it to you if you would like?"

'_Well, my impression of Hermione has just gone up. Not only has she been using the same method to watch Malfoy as us, she has cast it well enough that we didn't notice it.' _Tom was amused.

"_Us, Tom? That's kind of you but I think you meant to say that I didn't notice it."_

'_Well, I have to take some responsibility for not advising you to check for such magic near you.'_

Harry returned Hermione's smile, "That sounds pretty interesting. How about in the common room before we go out for lunch?"

Hermione's smile faltered a little as she recalled that Harry had once again organised an outdoor lunch using the house-elves but nodded, "Sure. Do you want to learn as well Ron, Neville?"

Ron and Neville both shook their heads. Ron replying first "Naah. Term is over, learning is the last thing I want to think about now."

Neville, "Maybe later. I've got to write a letter to Gran. Let her know how I thought I went so she can compare it to my actual results."

Harry resisted the urge to comment on that.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Harry took the baton from Fred and kicked off from the little wooden platform. Roger Davies had fumbled their Baton pass from Cho Chang and he had almost tumbled from his broom when it refused to take off.

Harry recalled how impressed Professor Flitwick had been by that tricky charm and very grateful that Harry had provided the rules and required charms for the game on a long roll of parchment. Harry wished he hadn't needed to lie to the little professor about the source of the rules, and hoped that it wouldn't come back to haunt him. So far nobody had asked any more questions about the so called broom racing fanatic that had sent him a copy of the rules and required charms. In actual fact Tom had remembered the rules from a trip in Southern Europe, then Harry had used a modified memory to words charm to have a quill to write it all out. Tom had been pleasantly surprised that it worked and Harry had been over the moon to actually have in his hands something from Tom. To him it was the first physical evidence of Tom's existence. Logically it shouldn't have meant that much but emotionally it struck a deep chord.

Tom had rambled for a bit after that so he also must have been affected more than he had admitted, _'Well cast, Harry. That looks just like I pictured it. Not sure the rules are according regulation but they will do for what you need. With a bit of practice some of the books I have worked on could now be printed. I have a number that would be useful to you and a few that, well, I just would like to see published.'_

"_You wrote books? When?"_

'_Whilst you were growing up, I needed something to do. When I was younger and less cynical I truly thought I could fix the wizarding world. I was going to start by fixing the education system so I had planned a number of books regarding that and a number on fixing the political system. I just used my spare time to complete and polish them up. I've also put together a number containing the spells I learnt and developed. I never expected any of them to be anything more than mental exercises to organise and help remember things but now… Well, first I will have to reread them as it's no longer just a mental exercise. They could be used to help you. Some, however, are just too dark to ever publish.'_

"_But how do you write a book when you are… what is it like where you are, Tom, if you don't mind me asking?"_ Harry had asked hesitantly.

'_It's okay, Harry. We have never really talked about it, but it's not a problem. Mostly I feel like I'm just floating with my eyes closed. If you share your vision it's like my eyes open and I am seeing though a large window. What you hear sounds to me like it's in a unseen room next door. Other sensations like smell and taste come to me like a memory of past events. When I want to write I retreat to my personal mindscape. Beside all my Occlumency defences, I have a room with books and notes. My presence within is like that of a ghost, only partially there, but I can handle a quill, read and write. It's not like it was when I was alive but it's a passable imitation.'_

Harry had wished to visit it, but Tom had thought it would be a bad idea to try and link their minds any closer than they were already without knowing what the consequences of trying to enter each other's mindscapes might be.

Harry's thoughts returned to the game.

As Harry pushed his broom hard to catch Roger Davies as the fourth year shot through the third set of hoops, he reminded himself he needed to do something special for Tom for suggesting setting this competition up. Even though Tom declared it a reward for doing well with his wandless charm work, Harry thought it was too wonderful to leave it as just that.

Harry started rolling as he headed into the fourth set. The fifth ring was much lower and it was easier to lift the broom rather than push it away, so he was going to try an inverted dive to save speed. It was a tricky move and he hadn't tried it in any of the races, but this was the last lap and Davies was still half a section in front of him. Davies was already pulling his broom up to line up with the first ring of the fifth set when Harry shot below him inverted, his feet just missing Davies. That was the easy bit. It was pulling out of the fast dive that was the challenge.

Harry barely heard Davies gasp as Harry wrenched his broom hard right as he started rolling. It was a trick that he had been playing with. The combination turn and roll meant he went into a slide and the broom responded by shaking crazily. Harry grunted as he gave one mighty push with his hands and magic and brought the broom around to roughly the right direction. His broom had managed to keep most of his speed and had caught up. Davies was right above him and only half a broom length in front as they entered the first ring. However Davies had the best line, whilst Harry was still trying to steady his broom when they entered the second ring. Harry felt the cushioning charm around the ring pulling on his feet, slowing him down. He had no room to maneuver and Davies had position over him so Harry moved his weight forward and tucked his feet up behind him. He could already imagine the scolding he was going to get from Hermione after this, she knew how unstable this position was, having researched it after he had first demonstrated it. Her raised voice had let him and all their friends know what she thought of his experiments with advanced broom riding techniques.

Still it was enough, he avoided the cushioning charms on the third ring. Davies glanced behind and, noticing Harry's position, allowed his broom to drift down to block him. Harry couldn't resist a grin, it was the obvious move and the wrong one. Harry rolled and urged his broom around. In a dizzying twist he rolled over and flicked his broom head up and around. It worked perfectly. His broom twisted through the tail end of Davies' broom charms and they helped Harry shoot forward. Davies gasped in surprise as Harry surged past above him and upside down.

Half a broom length ahead was all the edge Harry needed and the next two sets of rings went past without any danger of losing his place. There was an explosion of green sparks as Harry was first through the finish ring and once again Harry was on cloud nine as the crowd cheered and applauded. As he brought his broom over to the stands he even saw Hermione clapping and cheering though she spared him a little amused shake of the head when she caught his eye.

Soon he was caught up in a four way hug as the Weasley twins and Katie grabbed each other and started to dance around in a circle shouting something that Harry was too giddy to even hear.

Harry couldn't have imagined a better way to finish the term.

..

...

* * *

_**Author Notes: **__Welcome to all my new followers. Number of comments(reviews) dropped for last two chapters, chance/reason? Feed me, Seymour! Advice for improving my writing always appreciated even if I may not be capable of fixing everything. _

_This was a rather random chapter, I don't really plan out much about what will happen in a chapter but this one didn't go where I was planning at all. I didn't have any idea what I was writing until it appeared. Hope it was still an enjoyable read. Kinda wish I hadn't bothered giving the chapters titles, hard to think of appropriate titles. _

_Thanks as always to Aletheya for proofreading. Replies to reviews posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/_


	15. Chapter 15 - Travel by Train

_**Previous Chapter -**__ Harry learns that the movement of the planets has more to do with magic than he realised. After causing another Draco potion accident Harry discovers Hermione is trickier that he ever expected. Harry's team narrowly wins a quidditch relay race that he organised. _

* * *

**Chapter 15 - Travel by Train**

* * *

Harry looked down at Ron and wondered again why he had let himself be dragged away from the queue for the carriages. They were both about the same height, two of the tallest in their year, but at the moment Ron was staring at his feet with his chin almost touching his chest. Harry made a motion with his hand hoping to prompt Ron to start talking, but it was ignored. A minute passed before Harry finally lost patience and spoke, "Spit it out Ron. The others are almost at the front of the line. Why did you drag me over here?"

Harry could see Ron grimace though he didn't lift his head when he spoke, "What do you think of Millie, Harry?"

Well that was not what Harry had expected Ron to ask about. He was sure it was going to be about visiting Ron again over Summer. Too far away in his mind for plans to be made.

"Eh… she's nice enough Ron. You didn't upset her again did you?"

"No, no. It's just that… should I buy her a Christmas present?"

Harry squeezed his eyes closed for a moment as he tried to wrap his head around this, "Um… why? Do you want to buy her a present?"

Ron nodded and finally looked up and met Harry's eyes, "Yes, but she's a Slytherin and a half-blood. What'll happen if my mum finds out?"

Harry already had heard how Ron's mother wasn't keen on any interaction with Slytherins at all but this was a bit new, "I thought your mother didn't care about all that pureblood nonsense."

Ron shrugged, "Well she's friendly enough with everyone, well not anyone from Slytherin, but she already told me so many times that she doesn't want me to date any girls that don't have good prospects. Pureblood or successful she wants. Well, she wouldn't use those words but…"

Harry shook his head in wonder and gave Ron a faint grin, "Are you dating Millie?"

"No. No, we are not dating." Ron was rather surprised at being asked that.

"Well then, what are you worried about? Just buy a present and send it to her as a friend. If your mum asks, tell her it's just for one of your study group friends."

Ron instantly cheered up, "Of course. She's just a study group friend. What was I worried about? Thanks Harry, you're a great friend. You have a great Christmas and I'll see you when you get back."

Harry and the others waved to Ron as their carriage set off to Hogsmeade station.

_-my-friend-tom-_

It was many hours later and Harry was frustrated. His holiday plans had already been derailed and Tom wasn't able to cheer him up since he was just as frustrated by the turn of events.

'_They've swapped again.'_

"_Yep. I see him. Must have apparated, surprised he is familiar with the route."_

'_The lady seems a lot more comfortable on the station. Probably muggleborn or halfblood and scouted out the path to Little Whinging in advance.'_

"_Wish we could just lose them." _Harry was frustrated, he really didn't want to go back to his number four.

'_Indeed. But they must already be suspicious when you weren't picked up at the station.'_

"_At least it doesn't seem like they mean me any harm."_

Harry found a seat and pulled out one of his french books and lost himself in conjugations.

The straw haired man didn't leave the train when Harry did and it only took him a second to spot the tall lady sipping a tea at the nearby cafe. She had changed the colour of her clothes again but they were still the same style. The other man had been just as careless in changing his appearance, obviously neither thought very highly of Harry's power of observation.

Sighing Harry wiggled his backpack into a more comfortable position and set off down the road towards Privet Drive. He had only taken a few steps when Tom stopped him.

'_Go to the public library. Might as well get some new reading material for tonight.'_

"_Why? Thought we were going to go shopping in Diagon Alley first? Surely they'll leave me alone when we get to number four."_

'_Possibly, but I don't think it's worth the risk. Better to stay the night and then go in tomorrow morning.'_

Harry wish he could groan out loud but he was being watched so he tried to satisfy his urge for dramatics with a small sigh as he changed direction and headed for the library.

Harry had the sensation that he was being followed all the way from the fish and chips shop to the Dursley's but he didn't see anyone. He guessed an invisibility cloak or a really good disillusionment charm. There was no way to tell and even the wards at home could only confirm that there was someone sitting in the neighbor's backyard, someone that he couldn't see.

Harry finished up the fish and chips in his room before popping his head into the lounge room to let the Dursley's know he was home for the night, but not to worry about him as he wouldn't be needing any breakfast tomorrow.

Vernon gave a grunt of acknowledgement and Petunia just gave him the briefest of glances before they turned their attention back to the newspaper and magazine they were reading.

The hidden presence remained in the neighbor's yard till the sun had set then moved a little further from the house before vanishing.

"_I really hope they don't come back tomorrow."_

'_Indeed. Still you did want to practice your french and get your homework out of the way so no time is wasted.'_

"_I guess, but I didn't want to be doing it here. Guess you're right though, too late to go back to London now."_

Harry wasn't very tired so he spent an hour on his transfiguration homework before he felt he needed a break. He opened the french book he had gotten from the library and practised translating for an hour before he realized that his mind had been miles away for a few minutes. Discarding the book, he gently extracted his mother's journals from his book bag and just held them to his chest for a few minutes before putting the first two aside.

The first of the journals was half full of notes on her experimentation with herbs and healing potions, however it was all way too advanced for him to properly understand. Tom told him that there were certainly some interesting ideas in it and when he was older he'd be able to make better use of it.

The second book was filled with notes on advanced charm and arithmancy. It was significantly thicker than the other two journals and his mother had obviously added extra pages to it a few times. It was even more technical than the first journal, and was mostly written in code or in various languages. Tom believed it was mostly for a charms mastery project but until they were able to break the code it was hard to be sure.

The last and most worn journal was the one he opened. It was Lily's idea journal and amongst ideas of new charms and notes on spells she found interesting, she had written down many short personal comments. Harry loved reading the small fragments that talked about things she had seen, learnt or done especially when the comments mentioned his father and their friends. None of the pages were dated but Harry had so far managed to work out that it started sometime in her last year of Hogwarts and, after a brief perusal of the last few pages, continued up till after he was born. Now he was letting himself read two pages a night as he wanted to make the book last.

He removed his animated dragon bookmark and smiled down at the page. At the top of the revealed page there was a small stick figure demonstrating wand movements. They were for a house painting charm that his mother had copied from a home making magazine and he wondered how the original magazine had presented the wand movements. The figure was rather lopsided and occasionally fell over, though the wand movements were easily followed. Harry had already discovered that his mother liked using stick figures and the journal was filled with little men waving wands or demonstrating antics of her friends. Sadly the actual charm she had used to create the stick figures didn't seem to be in this journal.

His eyes moved past the charm to the first of the short notes on the page.

_When will James learn? He managed to break his ankle again during Quidditch practice today. Well, after. Trying to do some sort of high speed landing and went down in a heap in front of the boys. Sirius just laughed and took him up to sick bay upside down._

Lily had drawn a pair of stick figures below the words. One was hanging upside down by one foot while the other figure was walking behind it waving his wand. A little bubble with "ha ha" inside floated along beside it. When it got to the side of the page it vanished and reappeared on the other side.

Harry watched the little figures walk across the page a few times with a happy smile. After the picture was a lengthy piece about a potion to add glittering highlights to hair and various variants that his mum and her friends had come up with. Harry skipped it and the following beauty tip about eyelashes to the next personal message.

_Marleen warned me that Severus has been staring at me again. Sometimes I think he wants to apologize, other times I wonder if he is just looking for new ways to torment James. I do hope he is not already lost. _

Harry reread that paragraph a dozen times trying to get to grips with everything that the words hinted at. Was his mother really worried about Snape's well-being? He recalled earlier comments talking about Snape's continued efforts to enact revenge on his father and his friends for their actions during their younger years. It seemed James had grown out of that behavior well before Snape. It sounded like Sirius was tamer than before, less likely to say something but still as willing as ever to continue it.

"_Tom, do you know what happened to my parents' friends?"_

'_I know Remus Lupin was courting the other werewolves, Sirius Black was proving to be an effective Auror and a nuisance to Voldemort, Peter Pettigrew was working odd jobs whilst feeding Voldemort information on Dumbledore's ineffectual resistance movement. We could go back and check Daily Prophets from those days when you return to Hogwarts.'_

Harry shook his head, _"Not yet. I'm not ready to read anymore about how happy everyone was after my parents died."_

'_I understand. Whenever you are ready.'_

Harry returned to reading but there wasn't anything else of interest so he returned to watching the stick figure of his dad being carried upside down across the page for a while before going to sleep.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Harry's wards were not picking up anything unusual around the house the next morning so Harry left early. He stopped at the corner shop for a simple breakfast consisting of a muesli bar and some juice before returning the mostly unread book to the library and retracing his train journey back to the city.

Whilst he waited to change lines he entered the public toilets and applied his disguise. He switched into some rather distinctive and expensive clothes quite unlike his normal style. He stowed his glasses. A small amount of transfiguration had changes the colour and style of his backpack, he kept his moleskin bag within. After gelling up his hair into a rather modern looking spike he applied glamours to age him a few years, change his features and turns his eyes brown. He hoped that even those few that could see through glamours wouldn't be able to easily recognise him. The last part of the disguise all came down to attitude. He tried for a toned down Malfoy, the version before he had implemented his plan to discredit the boy.

After returning to the platform there was only a few minutes' wait for the train. He risked a few wandless detection spells just to get a sense of any magic and was happy to feel nothing.

It was surprising just how much more enjoyable the train ride was when he didn't have the sensation of being watched and followed the entire time.

Harry amused himself by trying to guess what jobs people had. He did try to involve Tom in the game but his invisible friend had just scoffed at the unimportance of giving the muggles more than a second glance.

"_Why the long face?"_

'_As if you can see my face.' _Tom's voice was snide.

"_You know what I mean. Something's wrong."_

'_Nothing's wrong. Go back to your muggle watching._'

Harry rolled his eyes and thought for a moment, _"Did I do something wrong? Is it to do with the muggles?"_

'_What? No! Why would I get upset about the muggles. They are beneath us. Might as well get upset by sheep. Forget it.'_

Harry persisted, _"Then why are you so moody? Ever since, well, the last train change… Is it because we are getting closer to Diagon Alley? I thought you were looking forward to getting access to the bookshops?"_

'_No! Nothing to do with Diagon Alley.'_

Harry paused a moment, _"Is it to do with your old room?"_

There was silence inside Harry's head.

"_Tom? Is there is something wrong with it? We could stay somewhere else."_

Tom's sighed and his voice was rather flat, the anger drained away,_ 'No. It's the best place for you. I'm sorry Harry. I've just been reliving memories of unpleasant times is all.'_

"_I thought you blocked most of those memories away?"_

'_Indeed, but there were defences about the room that I wanted to check. So I had need of those memories again. I shouldn't have let it affect my mood.'_

"_Is there anything I can do to cheer you up? A game of chess maybe?"_

'_Thanks for the offer Harry but you are hardly able to present challenge worthy of my intellect.'_

Harry lifted his hand to his mouth to conceal the small grin,_ "Just because you so love playing with Ron. Would you rather talk about the Chudley Cannons?"_

'_Please don't remind me. His irrational belief that the Chudley Cannons ascent to glory is imminent is hardly the highlight of my weekly games of chess with him.'_

Harry was doing his best not to laugh now, _"Enough, Tom. I'm not going to be able to hold it in."_

'_You are not the one who has to try and plan moves whilst you are both chattering away. How he keeps up his end of the conversation whilst playing I will never understand. It's not like he is a shining example of an intellectual.' _

"_That's probably the nicest thing you've said about him." _

_'I've complimented his chess skill previously.'_

"_Well I guess that's true in the literal sense. I do believe what you said was that his chess skill was the one bright spot in an otherwise worthless landscape of weak willed flesh. Very complimentary."_

_'You disagree?'_

"_Come on. He's not that bad, and he's getting better."_

Tom snorted,_ 'Go back to your muggle watching. We'll be there in five minutes.'_

_-my-friend-tom-_

* * *

_**Author Notes:**__ Many thanks to the reviewers of the last chapter. I spend a lot of time reading other peoples stories and there is such great stuff out there and it's good to see that my efforts are still appreciated. It's truly rewarding/motivating to get positive/constructive feedback. Entertaining others is great, being able to improve my writing is a bonus. I have a new concern/question; should I bother with the 'Previous Chapter' inserts? Are they helpful? I already know I don't put a lot of effort into them, but should I bother at all? _

_Once again thanks to the tireless work of Aletheya who continues to vanish the multitude of errors I submit to her. _

_Replies to reviews posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/ _


	16. Chapter 16 - Tom's Cupboard

_**Previous Chapter -**__ Ron is worried that his friendship with Millie will bring him into conflict with his mother's' wishes. Harry is followed by two wizards from King's Cross to Privet Drive. Afterwards he spends time reading through one of his mother's journals and discusses his family's friends with Tom. The next day a disguised Harry catches the train back to London._

* * *

**Chapter 16 - Tom's Cupboard **

* * *

The walk through Diagon Alley was happily uneventful. Harry enjoyed the anonymity that the disguise and glamours provided. He ignored Tom's continual prodding and spent half an hour browsing the goods at Quality Quidditch Supplies before leaving that shop. He took with him a few magazines but resisted purchasing anything else as it had been made pretty obvious to him that a few of his friends and teammates were planning on buying him quidditch related Christmas presents.

When he finished his walk of Diagon Alley he turned into the narrow lane a little past Ollivander's. The tiny street sign attached to the a small second hand clothing store was too faded to read but Tom had already told Harry than it once read Hazel Lane. The numbering of the small apartments and offices that lined the lane followed no pattern that Harry could discern, but it still took no time at all to find his destination, Hook and Jingle's Affordable Lodgings. Harry guessed magic was involved, as the copper nameplate was surprisingly easily to read despite being dark and pitted with age. The building itself was just as worn, but still solidly built. It had three stories but, with each a little shorter than the previous, it was only a little taller than the adjacent buildings, both each a story less.

He ignored the brass bell and used a simple unlocking charm to bypass the weak protections on the public door. He walked past the simple door marked office and along the narrow hall up the even narrower stairs. He climbed two flights, which certainly wasn't high enough to clear the top of the hall but still put him on the next floor. He walked down another small hall, took the first right and was presented with a hall so narrow that he could easily touch both walls with his elbows without stretching. Midway down the hall two doors stood facing each other. The end of the hall was blank except for a tiny dusty window near the roof.

"_This is the place Tom?"_

_'Yes.'_

"_Which door?"_

_'Neither.'_

"_What?"_

_'Think of it as a test Harry. If you can't find my hideout and gain entrance with everything I have taught you, then you are not ready for what is inside. We will have to find alternate accommodation.'_

"_But..."_

_'You are wasting time, Harry.'_

Harry closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths and pictured the hallway in his mind.

"_Okay. Well it's too long for anything but the most general magical detection spells so let's break it down. Two doors, wall before and after each door and at the end. Roof and floor which I will separate into three sections, before doors, between doors and after doors. That's... Twelve plus the end, thirteen areas."_

Tom didn't make any comment so Harry imagined a piece of parchment and a quill and had it write down the side a list of numbers from one to thirteen. Even since Tom had taught him that little mental trick he had made use of it to keep track of many things.

He almost started casting the detection spells before he realised his position and quickly put on a notice-me-not charm, a simple sound ward behind him and a few alert wards on the two doors and the hall behind him.

_'Those really should have been your first actions, Harry.'_

Harry sighed, he wanted to say something about not expecting a test but he knew that Tom was right. Another few deep breaths were followed by three broad magical detection charms, covering magical concentrations, wards and notice-me-nots. Then, area by area, he cast the three more focused detection spells until he finished with the end wall. After casting each spell he made a simple scratch next to a number. Three scratches and he moved to the next.

"_Nothing, Tom. A few alerts and locks on the door. Faded cleaning charms. Just... eh... I must have made a mistake. Missed one area." _Harry was looking at his mental list which showed twelve rows of three scratches next to the thirteen numbers.

Sighing he scribbled across the scratches and started afresh to their right. Being more familiar with the enchantments on the doors and walls it took less time to recast the charms and, once again, Harry found himself looking at twelve rows of scratches.

"_I miscounted again. Must be more tired than I thought."_ Harry rubbed his eyes, stared down the hall and started planning what other detection spells to cast. He tried to work out what other spells could be useful but he just couldn't seem to forget about the miscount.

He looked down the hall and pointing his finger started counting the areas, _"... 9, 10, 11, 12. I must have made a mistake when I visualised it."_

He closed his eyes and created a small model of the hallway and marked the surfaces. _"... 9, 10, 11, 12, 13. What the hell?"_

He repeated the exercise twice more before he was sure that if he counted the surfaces with his eyes open he only got twelve, but with them closed he got thirteen.

"_What's going on, Tom?"_

_'Work it out, Harry.'_

"_If I didn't know better I would think there was a notice-me-not on one of those sections. But I've already eliminated that. It couldn't be a fidelius charm because I wouldn't be able to notice anything wrong without a hint of the secret and it feeling wrong. It couldn't be a compulsion because I would have felt it on my shields."_ Harry paused, that last statement felt slightly wrong.

He cast a charm to detect compulsions and was very surprised to see everything become tinted.

"_How is that possible? I didn't feel a thing. I thought you told me that my shields were good enough that there wasn't a compulsion that could get past without me being aware?"_

_'I did.'_

"_Then how... oh... it didn't get past my shields."_ Harry smiled and cast a counter and watched the tint fade away. He cancelled his charm and started counting areas again. He gritted his teeth when he got twelve again. Recasting his detection charm the tint returned, but now he had worked it out. It took only a few more moments to erect a simple ward against compulsions on his eyes and finite it again before finally he was able to count the section of wall past the right door.

"_Very tricky. I haven't read about anything like that."_

_'And I hope you never will. I was very proud of that piece of magic. I spent hundreds of hours after leaving Hogwarts researching compulsion charms. I doubt there is anyone alive that can match my skill in that particular area. I will teach you, but I never wrote nor ever will write what I learn down and ask that you do likewise. They are too easy to abuse which, sadly, was the entire reason why I studied them so thoroughly.'_

It took only a few more minutes to break the simple chameleon charm on the cupboard doors at the end of the hall and recast it so that only he could see through it. The runes to keep it active were already there so he just recharged them. Harry could see at a glance that the compulsion charm that forced viewers' eyes to skip over the section was beyond his ability to modify or recast, so he just endeavoured to remember to cast the counter each time he returned to this hall.

He was surprised to find that, apart from the charm and the chameleon charm, there were no wards, charms or any sort of traps on the door. He questioned Tom on this.

_'Why do you think that may be, Harry?'_

It took Harry a moment before he understood, _"Because their magic would weaken the effectiveness of the compulsion and chameleon charms."_

_'Very good.'_

Harry still was very cautious in opening the door. A physical and magic shield went up first and then he conjured a spectral hand to first open the right side and then the left side of the cupboard doors. The ghostly hand he allowed to float idly by as he looked in to see a clothing rail with a number of old cloaks hanging from it. A bucket and mop leaned to one side and a box of cleaning supplies sat innocently in the middle of the floor.

This time he instantly felt the compulsion as it touched his shields. There was a need for him to shift the cloaks to the side. It started subtly and, when that failed it, suddenly increased in strength massively. Harry was stunned by its power and went down on one knee as he poured all his strength into his shields. He was very glad he had been standing a few feet from the doors, as it would have been too easy to accidentally topple into the cloaks. He allowed his consciousness to retreat behind his shields. It took him a moment before he had gathered his wits and turned his attention to the walls. Pleased that everything was holding he added a simple shield, a floating hand, designed to just block out that one particular spell. Once done he let his attention return to the cupboard. He could still sense the compulsion, but it was now beating ineffectually against the ghostly hand inside his mind. He was amused to realise that the hand he created in his mind was identical to the one he still had floating beside him.

A few simple detection spells later and the cloaks, box, broom and bucket were all glowing a sickly green.

"_Poisoned, but not a colour I recognise. What would have happened if I touched any of those?"_

_'A painful death, more than likely. I seem to remember coming up with a potential antidote but due to the scarcity of certain ingredients I never bothered testing it. The poison is snake venom imbibed with an extremely dark curse.'_

"_How is such a thing made?"_

_'Through a very dark process that I plan to take to the grave with me and hope that it is never rediscovered. I will however teach you what I worked out about cures to such dark magic when you are advanced enough in potions and transfiguration.'_

Harry almost asked what did transfiguration have to do with poisons and antidotes but realised exactly what kind of answer Tom would have given him: when you're advanced enough you might be able to understand.

A few minutes later he moved the cloaks and box aside with his ghostly helping hand magic and started casting detection spells on the back of the cupboard. He moaned when he saw just how many Tom had layered there.

_"Do I have to break all of them?"_

Tom sighed, _'Probably, the password is in Parseltongue and I don't believe it's possible for you to learn the language of snakes even if I could speak it aloud.'_

_"Do I have to know the language to speak the password? "_

_'More than likely. Parseltongue is the language of snakes, magic part of every word. The password is all will bow and you are welcome to try saying it.' _Harry wondered why Tom had said the password with a strange accent.

Harry nodded, _"Okay, so what does it sound like in parseltongue?"_

There was a pause before Tom asked, _You can understand me?_

Harry shrugged, _"Sure, the accent isn't that strong."_

Tom said a few words in a strange language, _'Jūs varat saprast?'_

_"That's the password?"_

_'No, that was Latvian. How is it that parseltongue sounds like English to you?"_

Harry shrugged a little confused.

_'Close up here. We need to go purchase a magical snake before we go any further.'_ Tom's tone held a mixture of excitement and confusion.

Ten minutes later a still confused Harry, after returning the entrance to Tom's Hideout back to it's original state, had made his way to The Magical Menagerie. He had briefly contemplated entering during his walk up the street but Tom had been getting overly insistent about hurrying up at that time.

_'Purchase the small green striped snake. It's only mildly magical but will do fine for what we need.'_

Harry peered at the little snake. He had only just walked to the glass cages of snakes and hadn't even had time to start reading all the labels. A short while later and a few galleons poorer Harry was crouched at the end of an alley behind a powerful notice me not unwrapping the glass cage with the little snake inside.

The snake hissed at Harry, I'm hungry, human.

Harry almost dropped the cage, _"I understood that!"_

Tom's voice was very pleased, _'Surprising, but very good. Try speaking to it.'_

Harry blinked a couple of times then pulled out one of the other packages he had bought, I have some miniature mice, will they be okay?

The snake reared back in surprise, You are a speaker!

Harry was likewise surprised, You can understand English?

_I can learn if you teach me, master._, replied the snake.

But…

Tom interrupted him, _'You are speaking Parseltongue, Harry. It just sounds like English to you. It works similar to a translation charm, in that what you hear and say seems to you just like your native language, though others hear something different. I will teach you how to choose which language to use and ,with practice, you will also be able to hear the actual sounds you and the snakes make. However, for the moment, with the help of that snake you should be able to enter my hideout with tearing down all my wards. It's time to return.'_

Harry was having trouble taking it all in, so he just followed Tom's suggestion.

As he rewrapped the cage he explained his actions to the little snake, I'm going to go to my new home ,so I'll just wrap you up till we get there.

The snake hissed, Where will I go master? If you keep me, I'll make a good companion.

Harry had almost finished the rewrapping before he replied, I think I'd like that.

As he headed back towards Hazel Lane he remembered something and, rolling his eyes, he asked, "All will bow?"

'_I know. Terrible! I'll show you how to change it and how to set the wards to alert you if anyone attempts to open it.' _

_-my-friend-tom-_

Unlike the hallway and staircase, which had been lit by ancient gas lamps with yellowing and fading lumus charms, the room beyond the cupboard was brightly lit. Harry had to blink and look down which was when he noticed that, even with the cupboard door open, the light did not spill into the hall. He made a mental note to learn the charm responsible for that piece of trickery.

After his eyes had adjusted to the light, he looked around for the light source but wasn't able to find any.

_'You expected a dark and dingy hideout? This is where I spent many years studying. Good light is essential to concentration, so I incorporated a radiance charm into the roof ward.'_

Harry nodded and let his gaze fall from the roof as he entered the hideout properly. The area in which he now stood in was roughly squarish, with a scattering of mismatched furniture. Half of one wall opened up into a small kitchenette. A partially opened door nearby led to a small bathroom.

The walls were buried beneath layers of posters, pictures, maps, lists, notes and diagrams. The posters drew his eye, the biggest was one of Hogwarts taken from the air, the clouds flickered strangely as the point of view jerkily moved around the castle. Harry presumed the strange moment was due to faded animation charms. Still, the poster brought a smile to his face.

_'Hogwarts was the closest thing to a home that I ever had. I'll teach you how to recharge the charm later. The poster is even more impressive when everything is moving properly.'_

"_Thanks. What are all the maps for?"_

_'Many are related to my search for founders' artefacts. I also continued my research into dark creatures whilst I was here. The maps are related to my search for them. The diagrams and many of the lists are on how to control them.'_

Harry pointed at a collection of drawings of floating black robed figures. The pictures all seemed to exude an aura of menace,_ "Some of the dark creatures you were looking for?"_

_'Those are Dementors. I already knew where to find those, but learning to communicate and bargain with them came later. Very unpleasant creatures they are, feed on negative emotions which they force their victims to experience. Very hard to defend against and even harder to control. The ministry probably still believes they control them.'_

Harry turned his attention from the walls. He guessed it would take hours, if not days, to examine all the pieces of paper Tom had left there.

In the middle of the room was a large heavy table. A small number of thin books was stacked in one corner. A tall and narrow bookcase opposite the kitchen was filled with books, magazines and strange knick knacks. In one corner of the room was a shrunken four poster bed, currently only big enough for a toy. A miniature trunk sat at the foot of it. A second normal sized trunk rested nearer the small kitchen area.

_'I only trapped the stack of books on the table and the two trunks, however it's been many years and magic will do as it chooses so I would suggest you check everything first. My wards to preserve this room have not been maintained in thirty years.'_

So Harry proceeded to check and clean the room. There was surprisingly little dust or dirt in the room however the stasis charms on the food within the pantry had long gone and he needed to use many vanishing and cleaning spells before he was able to safely cancel his hastily cast air freshening charm.

By the time he had finished cleaning the room and recharging the wards Harry was getting a little tired. It had taken rather a lot of magic to get them all back to full power. He had been surprised to find any power in them at all.

'_I attached the ward schemes for the room to that of the building. Just enough of a connection so that I could siphon off a little bit of power without it being easily detected. I was generous with feeding it power whilst I lived here, which is why they haven't all faded.'_

"_How long did you live here?"_

'_Around three years. Most of that time I worked at Borgin and Burkes. That enabled me to collect a selection of valuable objects. Some I bought, some I tricked their owners out, others I just outright stole. Many are in that large chest but are of no real interest, unless we need access to a little extra spending money. Apart from the books on the bookshelf ,the main things I want you to have are in the shrunken chest by the bed. Cancel the charm, but be careful, the bed is in the same charm and it does take up a fair amount of room.'_

Harry stepped a little further from the bed and with a wave of his hand cancelled the charm. The bed and chest near exploded to their original size with a loud bang and Harry stumbled back in surprise swearing and reaching for his wand.

'_Ha. Not to worry, this room is well soundproofed. Just be glad you recharged those runes first.'_

"_Why didn't you warn me that it'd be so violent? Why was it like that anyhow?"_

'_Half trap and half amusement. I'd actually forgotten I had modified my shrinking charm. It was forty years ago, Harry, and I did say to be careful.'_

Harry frowned but didn't say anything more. He moved closer to the bed and cast detection charms on both the bed and trunk. That done he reaching for the trunk but paused just before he touched it, _"You said both trunks were trapped but I didn't detect anything."_

'_Indeed.' _Tom's voice was amused.

Harry crouched down beside the truck and examined it closely. It was a fairly basic trunk and looked like it had been owned by a number of people over the years. It had been repaired a number of times, sometimes well but usually not. It took him a few minutes to discover the small needle that was set to spring out when the latch was opened. Another minute to work out how to disarm it.

"_Poison?"_

'_Once. Though nothing lethal and it would have long faded to nothing that would have caused more than a faint irritation. I added it during my fourth year as a final deterrent to a certain overly curious teacher.'_

"_This was your school trunk then." _Harry added in understanding before opening it.

'_Down the bottom you will see a set of school robes and a vest. Take those both out and I'll tell you about them.'_

Harry extracted both items from under a selection of old clothes and laid them out on the bed before sitting down next to them. The robe looked just like his own except for the Slytherin trim and badge. The vest, however, was something very different. It was fashioned from five large overlapping panels of giant snake skin that were wrapped around a tube of black cloth and connected to two thick shoulder straps. The construction was rather crude but the thing had a special kind of beauty, the way the scales shimmered as it moved was almost mesmerizing.

'_That there Harry is basilisk skin. Shaped from freely given and freshly shed skin and enchanted in that same hour by moonlight. It'll block most blades and cutting spells and many minor curses, it'll also dampen any physical blows and bludgeoning style curses. As is likely obvious I cut and crafted it myself. It would not have been wise to alert anyone to the knowledge that I had access to such a creature. Especially whilst I was at school.'_

Harry run a hand across the material, _"It's amazing. Where did you find a basilisk?"_

Tom laughed, _'You'd never guess so I just have to let you in on a little secret. Under Hogwarts.'_

Harry blinked surprised but not doubting Tom's honesty, _"Under? There used to be a Basilisk living under Hogwarts?"_

'_Not used to Harry. I'm sure she still is. She often hibernates for decades or centuries at a time. As a Parseltongue you should be safe to visit her though I suggest we further examine your grasp of the language before we risk a journey down to her home.'_

Harry just nodded as he continued to look upon and touch the vest.

'_Put it on, Harry. The silk underlining stretches and is charmed to be comfortable against the skin. I'd like you to wear it all the time. It's designed to be near invisible under normal clothes.'_

As Harry started disrobing he asked, _"Why did you stop wearing it?"_

'_I replaced it with a better crafted one not long after I left Hogwarts and then many years later I used rituals to increase the natural resistance of my skin and no longer needed the additional protection. I don't recall where I left the other vest though it probably wouldn't fit you anyhow.'_

Harry slipped out of his t-shirt and pulled the vest on over his head. As Tom had said the silk stretched and the panels shifted as he wiggled his arms and neck though the holes. It was incredibly comfortable and did almost feel like a second skin. Each panel went about two fifths of the way around his body, giving each part of his torso two layers of protection. The basilisk skin didn't stretch much but the panels slid easily on top of each other so it didn't hinder his flexibility noticeably.

"_Wow! Thanks, Tom. This is excellent."_

'_You are welcome, Harry. Now cover it up with a t-shirt and your jacket and then put on the robe. It's time to go get some lunch.'_

"_You want me to wear a Hogwarts Slytherin uniform out on the street?" _Harry was a little confused. He didn't think he could pass as a Slytherin and his current identity was a few years past Hogwarts age.

'_Not at all. The robe has many enchantments added to it. Put it on and I'll teach you about them. You will need to recharge them all though. They were never designed to last this long. They are rune based so you can recharge them without actually needing to learn how to cast or create them.'_

Harry slipped on the heavy robe. It was too long, uncomfortably heavy and there seemed to be strange textures within the actual material. He also noted that, unlike his typical robes, it was hooded.

"_It's not very comfortable."_

'_I am not surprised. Feel the material. Tell me what you think.'_

Harry run his hands across the material. It looked flat on both the inside and outside but there did seem to be some strange texture inside it. Pressing it against one hand he started tracing shapes with his hand. It didn't take too long before he exclaimed, _"Runes! The runes are actually inside it."_

'_Indeed. Actually all wizarding robes have runes incorporated into the design, or at least they should. In ages past robes were the number one defensive tool of the wizard. Months went into the enchanting of robes and powerful wizards would wear robes literally covered in runes and protective charms. Hence the tradition of wearing such bulky clothes, they cover the largest amount of body which allows a single charm to offer almost total protection. They are also large enough to accept the most powerful enchantments. Of course these days robes are just seen as a fashion item and, apart from a few comfort and self maintenance charms, few are able to stop more than a dull butter knife.'_

Harry was still tracing the invisible runes with his finger. _"But this one is better than that."_

'_Indeed. I spent many hours crafting the runes within the layered material. An older girl at Hogwarts with superb needlework skills embroidered them for me in exchange for certain favours. Later I took away her memory of what she actually did for me though I did allow her to keep the payment. For the moment I want you to charge the runes, claim its ownership and then command it to resize itself to you and lose its Slytherin markings. It's capable of imitating any of the houses. A feature I rarely used but I am now glad I added. It'll also become a lot lighter and more flexible once the runes are charged.'_

"_Then lunch?"_

'_Then lunch.'_

* * *

_**Author Notes:**__ Keep those reviews/comments coming. I do read and enjoy them all. I try to answer as many questions as I am able to though sometimes a chapter or two (or three) may pass before I get to them. Also if you would like a private message rather than having just having my reply posted to the forum add a 'pm pls' at the end of your review. _

_Replies to reviews posted at __www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/ _

_Thanks again to Aletheya who is able to banish the errors I cast at her. _


	17. Chapter 17 - Christmas Eve

_**Previous Chapter -**__ Tom leads Harry to his old quarters and hideout just off Diagon Alley In the process of bypassing and attuning the wards to himself Harry, and Tom, discover that Harry is a parselmouth. Tom gifts Harry with his old basilisk skin vest and enchanted robes._

* * *

**Chapter 17 - Christmas Eve**

* * *

_-my-friend-tom-_

The first few days of the christmas break went quickly. Harry spent a lot of his time sorting out all the tomes in the hideout. Then he started studying Tom's old school books plus a few of the others. He had been keen to move on to the more advanced material but soon discovered that Tom was correct in advising him to start with the basics. Though advanced compared to many other Hogwarts students, the material that Tom had been studying was near incomprehensible to him.

He also spent a good part of each day wandering the shops of Diagon Alley. Quality Quidditch Supplies was definitely his favourite and he picked up a number of magazines and posters. He took everything apart from the poster of Hogwarts from the walls and stuck up his own posters. There was still plenty of pale brown patterned wall paper displayed afterwards. Harry considered replacing it but eventually decided that could be a task for another visit.

By Christmas eve Harry, or rather Douglas Boots, a twenty year old half blood, had sampled many of the restaurants and cafes of Diagon Alley. His story was that he had been home schooled by his aunt who had sworn him to secrecy about his fathers and her identity. Only a few people enquired any further and he just made some vague stories about doing some odd jobs in Europe over the past few years. Telling them it had been nothing illegal but he still had had to swear secrecy oaths. He also learnt that asking questions about people's own interests often worked as a good distraction and it came with the added bonus that he met a number of people that had led truly interesting lives.

Late Christmas eve morning an excited Harry was met at the train station by Hermione's parents. For the first time since the beginning of the holidays he was back to his normal appearance and feeling much better for it. He had mentioned to Tom that he had been a bit lethargic and wondered if it was due to the hideout and after an hour of investigating Tom had worked out it was the glamours that were draining his energy.

'_Yes, Harry. There are other glamours that use much less power but these are significantly better as they are extremely hard to detect. Even harder to do so subtly. Minor glamours are commonly used but using anything stronger is frowned upon. In fact the ones you are using to conceal your identity are restricted.'_

"_Restricted. So if I get caught I'd be in more trouble than if I used normal glamours?" _Harry was more curious than worried, using any magic at his age was technically illegal.

'_Yes. Though I would say having others learn that you knew such spells or knew a way to get around the trace on your wand would be more of a problem than any minor fine or reprimand given out by the Ministry at this time.'_

He had initially wished to remove the glamours in the hideout but had changed his mind when Tom had suggested that learning to leave them on and get use to the feel of them and their drain would be a worthwhile exercise. Now that they were gone he felt like he was lighter and couldn't stop smiling at every little thing. So his smile when Hermione ran across the station to give him a hug was especially bright.

"Harry. Oh I've so looked forward to your visit. I know it's only been a week but I've so much to tell you. Come on, mum and dad's parked across the road. There is some work being done in the carpark and dad hates to get the car dirty. Did you know we went to Stonehenge on the way back from visiting my cousins in Bristol. Well of course not but you do now and guess what, I could feel magic nearby. Not from the stones though. Do you know why? Have you ever been there?" She paused for just a moment as she stood back and examined Harry and his small backpack with a small frown. "Didn't you bring anything more? You are still going to stay with us for a few days?"

Harry's smile was broader than ever. He had missed Hermione and her excited chatter. "Calm down I've got plenty of clothes in my backpack. Bigger than it looks remember."

Hermione flushed, "Oh. Silly me. We've been travelling with normal suitcases because my cousins don't know about… all that. So what do you think about Stonehenge? I thought all the stones were going to be real magical but it was strange. Just normal rocks."

"_Tom. Any ideas?"_

'_Stonehenge that the muggles see is just a copy created over a thousand years ago when those that lived there decided to hide themselves from the muggles. The true monument is further north near surrounded by a magical community that you won't find mentioned in any ministry approved books. The people that live there are independent of the ministry. You can tell her that it's fake and the real one is further north. That at least is common knowledge that she could look up.'_

Harry did so and he and Hermione chatted about other supposedly magical or haunted sites and wondered if they also might be magical or fake. Harry didn't ask Tom about any of them though. it was too complicated to try and work out what he had to keep secret and what not and it was kind of fun just to guess. By the time the traffic lights had changed and they had crossed the road to meet up with Hermione's parents they were trying to come up with the most unlikely stories about ghosts at the Tower of London.

After a round of greetings Harry and Hermione continued to make up fantastical stories all the way to the restaurant.

As Daniel parked the car Hermione exclaimed, "It's a French restaurant! You remembered. Thanks mum, thanks dad."

Emma smiled from the front seat, "So have you both been practicing your french?"

Hermione nodded like a bobble head toy while Harry gave a slightly tight nod. He had kept up his study but only an hour or two at the most per week. He now wished he had spent a bit more time. As it was he was lucky in that Hermione carried the conversation and Harry had no trouble keeping up. The waiters also kept their french to a fairly basic level so that even Daniel with his half remembered high school lessons could keep up. Emma was fluent and the waiters even complimented her on her accent. She promised Hermione and Harry that they could practice with her after Christmas. As it was, Emma spent the following drive to the cinema chatting in, and helping them with, their french.

After an enjoyable couple of hours they headed back to Hermione's home.

"Don't torture yourself. That's my job."

Harry chuckled, "Nice one. How about, you're so sweet, you look just like a little entree."

Hermione laughed and Harry joined in.

When the calmed down Harry wondered aloud, "I wonder if some of the books in the restricted area are like those books. It'd be great for getting a suntan."

"I was more interested in 'Thing'. Remember how Flitwick animated that apple? I think an enchanted hand would be great for cleaning up rooms. Though it'd be better if it could float."

Harry smiled thinking back to the hand he had conjured at the beginning of the holiday. It had only been partially physical. He would have to work out a way to show it to Hermione.

"It was pretty good. We could ask Flitwick if there is such a spell."

Hermione giggled, "He'd wonder where we got the idea. I'm really happy you enjoyed it, Harry. What's your favourite movie? We have a whole selection of tapes at home and its not far to Ritz Video hire if you want something different."

Harry shrugged and gave a cheeky little grin, "The Addams Family. Since that's the only movie I've seen."

At Hermione's surprised look he added, "It's a long way to the nearest theatre from where I live and my cousin is always watching TV. I don't get along with him so I rarely go into that room."

Harry noticed that the conversation in the front seat trailed off.

Hermione pursed her lips then asked, "But didn't you ever go out with your friends? Surely one of their parents could have driven you?"

"I didn't actually spend any time with my friends outside school. We did our own things. I spent a lot of time walking and reading. I didn't want to turn into a Dudley."

"Your cousins sounds a bit like a couch potato."

"A couch potato?"

Hermione giggled, "Someone who spends all their time sitting in a couch and eating snacks. I guess I've watched a lot more TV than you too."

Harry smiled, "Actually it's a perfect description, he also looks rather like a potato. Big, fat and round."

"You don't get on with him?"

Harry shook his head, "Naah. He's a small minded bully but he knows better than to mess with me or my friends. I live with my relatives but I don't get along with them at all. Much prefer coming to spend the christmas with you. Thanks again for inviting me."

"You're welcome, Harry. I'm so glad you accepted. Normally we have my cousin and his family from Liverpool staying with us or we go up and stay with them but they are travelling overseas this year. I was so happy when mum said I was allowed to invite you. Tomorrow is going to be a lot of fun. We'll open presents first thing then spend some time just lazing around. We will meet up with grandma Judy and go to church with her before back to her place for lunch. Then we'll go ice skating. For dinner we will go to grandma and grandpa Granger's place." Hermione lowered her voice a little, "They are a lot more fun than grandma Judy."

There was a little snigger from the front seat but neither Granger commented and they soon restarted their own conversation.

Before dinner they ended up watching Edward Scissorhands which Harry enjoyed and after they watched Ferris Bueller's Day Off which left him smiling for ages.

_-my-friend-tom-_

In the minutes before lights out a pajama clad Hermione dragged Harry into the piano room and set out a couple of yoga mats. "I'm ready for you to try and test my defences Harry."

Harry raised his eyebrows, "Are you sure? There is a good chance I'm going to see some of your memories."

Harry had admitted to Hermione the previous day that he had also been practising the Legilimency exercises both from the books Hermione had picked up and a few others. She wasn't really interested in the field but had decided it was certainly the best way to test her own Occlumency.

Hermione nodded and smiled hesitantly, "I trust you, Harry. I don't have any secrets from you. Well at least no important ones. You won't tell anyone what you see will you? I'm not sure…"

Harry held up a hand to forestall her, "I promise I will say nothing about what I see in your mind without your permission."

'_Prepare yourself to be bombarded with the pitiful worries, woes and dreams of a preteen, Harry. This ought to be worse than daytime TV.'_

"_Shush you. This is important for her and that'll only happen if she hasn't put up strong defences."_

'_Yeah, like that is likely.'_

Harry ignored Tom and made sure he and Hermione were comfortably seated across from each other. Both chose to kneel on thin cushions placed atop the mats.

"Okay, Hermione. I going to test your mind now. Just remain calm and don't fight it this time. I just want you to concentrate on the sensations you feel." Harry wanted to reassure her that without using his wand it wasn't going to be that powerful but if her defences weren't strong that could end up with her being devastated with her progress.

"I'm ready." Hermione's was less frightened than he expected. Harry wondered if she truly did trust him that much.

Harry peered into Hermione's eyes and everything else faded away. There was a flash of apprehension and trust as he passed through her surface emotions and entered into her thoughts and memories. He could feel himself pass through a number of barriers, almost like crossing over ward lines. He let them react and though each immediately started to strengthen they just as quickly relaxed and let him past.

There he was in the present looking at a frozen image of himself sitting crosslegged staring forward. It was a little disconcerting as it wasn't like looking in a mirror. Glancing around Harry was a little surprised that there were no other thoughts clamouring for attention. Either Hermione had very good focus all the time or she was just very good at calming herself. No other first year that he had briefly glanced at had such a clean mind even when they were relaxed to the point of near sleep.

'_She has good focus, I'll give you that.'_

Harry took a moment to look at himself and worked out why it wasn't like looking at a mirror. The scar wasn't as prominent, his eyes almost glowed and his clothes were poorly defined. This was how Hermione saw him and Harry was pleased to see that it was his eyes not his scar that was more noticeable.

'_Are you staring at yourself, Harry?'_

"_Hey. I thought you couldn't see what I could when I was using Legilimency?"_

'_I can't. Not really. But I get faint echoes especially when you keep staring at the same thing for hours.'_

Harry huffed but didn't reply. It was true he had been staring at himself for what felt like a minute though he knew it was probably less than a tenth of a second. Still a long time when dealing with magical thoughts.

He forced himself to move on, sending his consciousness deeper into Hermione's mind. Looking for and finding the beginnings of her subconsciousness.

A library. He wasn't surprised, most books advised you to try to create a familiar landscape where you felt in control. Still the sheer size of the library was an impressive modification. Miles of shelves stretched miles in every direction until they were swallowed into the darkness when they were so far away that it was no longer possible to distinguish book from shelf. The shelves also towered far above him until their top most shelves also became too small too see and darkness took them too.

Harry tried summoning a nearby book but nothing happened. A few more attempts at magic and he was pleased to discover himself in a truly muggle environment. Interesting considering how magical such a huge library was. He took a few steps forward noticing the feel of familiar of firm carpet under his boots. He pulled a random book from a nearby shelf. It was thick, well bound and old. The brownish leather cover was embossed with a flowery pattern. He opened it and discovered it was blank. Smiling he opened a dozen more books at random finding each with a different pattern but still blank.

It was an impressive defence. He glanced at the ends of the shelves but didn't try deciphering the coded index. Even if he could break the code it wasn't an indication either way that anyone else could. He withdraw and smiled as Hermione blinked.

"I felt that. Each of my walls recognised you as you crossed them and then I saw the library. But it was different than how it was when I imagined building it."

Harry nodded, "Even when you relax your walls they are still there. You built them well. They are the first warning system you have for an intrusion. The reason the library wasn't how you pictured it is much of our perception is related to our own personal experiences. The library was using my own memories and expectations to fill in characteristics that you hadn't strongly defined. I suspect that the texture and number of books were what you focused on. Things like the darkness in the distance and the carpet were taken from my own thoughts as those things I recognise from my old school library."

"Should I explain which books I imagine my thoughts to be in?"

Harry shook his head, "No, that defence should be yours but I will try to break it a different way now. First I want you to strengthen your walls, let them know that no one is free to enter now. Then I will attempt to subvert your library and you can try to stop me and if I break through you should try and expel me."

"I shouldn't try to expel you straight away?"

"No, I don't want you to tire yourself out too quickly. Allow me to at least attempt to reach your memories first. If I can achieve that then we'll talk about that for a bit and then we can practice resisting and expelling intrusions. That can be the most tiring so we should do that last."

This time Harry felt the walls fight back as soon as they noticed him. The first solidified into a massive wall of huge stone bricks in front of him. He imagined himself smashing them down with a huge sledgehammer, but it had no effect. Next he tried blasting it with overpowered curses, this time it went well and within moments there was a large hole through which he was able to move to the next. This wall likewise solidified out of the air into a massive stone wall, thicker and taller than the first. This time he took a moment to examine the wall and then he was suddenly smoke and sliding through tiny gaps between the bricks. He smiled as he sensed Hermione's surprise. As he approached where the third wall was waiting to be triggered he could sense Hermione's anticipation building. He paused as close as he could to the point where it would detect him. He took a moment to meditate then noted Hermione's confusion and then shock as he resumed his forward movement and no wall appeared to prevent him.

This time his sitting self was not alone in her present mind. Around him floated a number of textbooks, each with its pages rapidly flicking past. He was amused to note they were all occlumency books and she was already trying to understand how he had bypassed her walls. He was tempted reminding her to focus but decided she would have to learn that the hard way.

Another thought and he had moved on to the library. The library was the same but this time Harry was wearing wizarding robes. He flicked his wand out and pointed it at a book.

"Accio book."

The book didn't move.

He concentrated and brought his wand up in front of his face.

"Lumos."

The faintest light appeared on the end of his wand.

He smiled and pointed his wand at the book again.

"Accio book."

This time the book flew into his left hand.

He let the book fall open and reveal its blank pages. He carelessly dropped it to the floor and looked around.

"Accio memory book."

There was a ruffling of pages and shuffling of books from high up and after a moment a single book came flying down. He easily caught it and let it fall open.

Suddenly he was watching himself walking along a lake holding Hermione's hand. It wasn't the lake at Hogwarts and he quickly realized that this was at the park that Hermione's parents had taken him for a picnic.

Suddenly a wind sprung up and the book slammed shut. It was trying to make him lose balance but he resisted it and pointed his wand up, "Show me memory books."

Books scattered amongst those on the sixth and seventh rows of shelves started glowing. There seemed to be some sort of pattern to which books glowed and which didn't and he was just starting to piece together of the beginnings of the pattern when the floor suddenly dropped away and he fell into darkness.

He blinked at the sudden light as he looked at a breathless Hermione. She looked about ready to faint so he quickly shuffled forward and caught her.

"Ohh… what happened? Why am I so tired?"

Harry let her lean on him, "Expelling someone from your mind can be very tiring. Once you can learn to wield your magic internally without expelling it alongside the intruder, it'll be fine. I think that'll be enough for tonight. You did really well, I'm very impressed."

"But you got through my walls, one didn't even activate and then you cast magic in my library and saw all my memories. You could see all the books that I thought were so well hidden. "

"The walls were good. I'll teach you how to make them stronger and also the tricks I used to bypass them so you can build defences against them. It's all a matter of me using my imagination to come up with methods that you think should work, even if subconsciously. I was using your doubt against you. Doubt that the second wall was solid enough. Doubt that I couldn't just bypass your wall and finally, doubt that your library was resistant to all magic. You are so much further along that I expected, tomorrow I'll run you through a few little exercises but tonight you should just rest. Don't worry about rebuilding your walls, you're too tired."

"I am tired." Hermione yawned.

"Here, let me help you." Harry lifted Hermione off the ground and almost carried her to her bed and quickly tucked her in with a smile.

"Good night Hermione." but he got no response except the faint breathing of a girl already asleep.

_-my-friend-tom-_

Later as Harry lay in his guest bedroom he returned to a topic that he had been simmering in the back of his mind all day.

"_Tom. Tell me more about the people at Stonehenge. I thought the Ministry of Magic was in charge of everyone in the U.K."_

'_They would like to believe they are and I expect for most that work there they probably also believe that. They have been spreading such propaganda for hundreds of years and there are few that care to dispute it. The village near stonehenge is named Henesbury, I only visited it once when I was in my late twenties questing for hidden knowledge.'_

Tom paused for a moment and Harry had the sense that Tom was remembering the past.

'_It was an unusual place, seemingly frozen in time. If you think the magical world under ministry control is backwards, believe me, you haven't seen anything till you have spent some time in Henesbury. Truly medieval in manner and dress, though a lot cleaner than it would have been. It's a mixed community of wizard and muggle though magic is not hidden within the wards that surround the lands. There are a large number of wizards of varied power, many of whom have apprentices. The most powerful rule, though most wield different styles of magic, each as varied from each other as they are to what is taught at Hogwarts. They do not take well to outside interference and I spent little time there before deciding that the time and effort to gain any secrets from them would be better spent elsewhere. They were not displeased to see me leave.'_

"_What do you mean by different styles of magic?"_

'_It's a rather complicated topic and without spending hours of just working through the groundwork no simple explanation can do it justice. If you are truly interested we can begin discussing them after the holidays, but let's just start with a simple example. When I visited Henesbury the head wizard was known for his ability to conjure and animate golems. He used a staff to channel his magic and frequently called upon the powers of storms to give his creations life. He taught his apprentices the same magic along with various common cantrips such as spells to create light, heat and move objects, those wandless. Together, you could say that was his style. I had hoped to learn from him but I found his oaths of apprenticeship demeaning and overly restrictive."_

Tom paused to collect his thoughts,_"The magic taught at Hogwarts is a combination of magics put together by the four founders of the school, each of which had their own personal style. The founders were not the first group to create a formalised magic system but they were the first to make it publicly available.'_

Harry was surprised to learn this. Nothing he had been taught or read about mentioned anything like this. _"So we are learning four different styles then?"_

'_No, according to those few that study such things Hogwarts teaches a restricted system of wanded magic. The four founders carefully selected certain topics to be taught, restricting much of their most powerful magic to only their senior apprentices, over the years the apprenticeship program has fallen into disuse and the ministry has further restricted spells and eliminated topics from the syllabus.'_

"_Such as dark magic?"_

'_So they say. Though their definition of dark magic is one of the vaguest of all that I've encountered. If there was a clear cut definition of what made a spell dark then it would be possible to create a ward against just those and any arithmancer or runemaster can tell you how impossible that is.'_

"_What about the unforgivables?"_

'_So named because they were a threat to spectators at duels, that's all. Sadly you'll find little written about such things these days unless you travel far and are willing to learn ancient languages. Though the ministry of magic has little political power across the water, its attitudes have spread like a plague. I'm glad you are interested in such topics but it sounded like Hermione was planning on waking you very early tomorrow so you better get some sleep.'_

"_But can't we talk just a..." _Harry was going to put forward more of an argument before he cut himself with an involuntary yawn. _"Ah, okay. Maybe tomorrow. Good night, Tom"_

'_Night, Harry.'_

_-my-friend-tom-_

* * *

_**Author Notes:**__ Thanks to those people that pointed out that I had referred to Hermione's mother's by two different names. I've settled on Emma Granger and corrected her name in chapter 4._

_Would love any feedback on my take on Occlumency/Legilimency. Was only going to be a short piece but it grew. On the other hand I kind of expected the points I had to make about dark magic and unforgivables to be a lengthy discussion. Neither turned out that way I expected. If there is interest I could expand on those topics later or just leave tidbits throughout the story._

_Yay for for my beta, Aletheya. _

_Replies to reviews posted at www fanfiction net/topic/135718/89507238/1/ or by pm if you request it._


End file.
